


Ben Edlund's The Great Race

by San Antonio Rose (ramblin_rosie)



Category: Supernatural RPF, The Great Race (1965)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - Historical, Cross-Posted on LiveJournal, F/M, SPN Cinema Challenge (Supernatural & Supernatural RPF), Silly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-09
Updated: 2014-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:54:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 29,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27616544
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ramblin_rosie/pseuds/San%20Antonio%20Rose
Summary: The Great Jensen wants to prove that American cars are the world’s best. Professor Collins wants to prove that he’s better than Jensen atsomething. Danneel Harris wants to prove that a woman can be any man’s equal. But when Jensen challenges all comers to an around-the-world automobile race from New York to Paris, the journey might just prove that true love conquers all.
Relationships: Jensen Ackles/Danneel Harris





	1. Opening Credits

**Author's Note:**

> Forget logic; forget probability; forget historical accuracy. Just embrace the silly.
> 
> Disclaimer: I don't know any of these people and mean no disrespect whatsoever. Especially in Misha's case, I'm mainly having fun with their public personae. I _do_ think this cast could do a bang-up job with an actual remake, though, should Warner Brothers be so inclined!

_For Mr. Laurel and Mr. Hardy  
And for Mr. Curtis, Mr. Lemmon, Mr. Falk, and Ms. Wood_

* * *

Ladies, Kindly Remove Your Tinhats

* * *

# SPN Cinema Presents  
Misha Collins 

[BOOOOOOOO!]

# Jensen Ackles

[YAAAAAAAY!]

# Danneel Ackles

[ _whistles_ ]

  


# IN  
Ben Edlund's  
**THE GREAT RACE**

## Co-starring  
Sebastian Roché and Jared Padalecki 

* * *

## Guest Stars  
(in order of appearance)

Jim Beaver and Samantha Ferris  
Alona Tal, Matt Cohen, and Richard Speight, Jr.

## With

Mitch Pileggi  
Chad Lindberg  
Jeffrey Dean Morgan  
Steven Williams  
Christian Kane  
Tom Welling  
Ty Olsson  
Timothy Omundson

## And Special Guest Star

# Baby

## As Herself

Technicolor  
Coded on AO3  
Director of Photography: Serge Ladouceur  
Music by Henry Mancini  
Prose adaptation by San Antonio Rose  
Based on the screenplay by Arthur Ross  
Original story by Blake Edwards and Arthur Ross

Produced by Eric Kripke

## Directed by  
Ben Edlund


	2. Chapter 1: A Rivalry

“Ladies and gentlemen!” yelled the announcer over the noise of the crowd that had gathered between the grandstand and the red, white, and blue hot air balloon one Saturday afternoon early in the spring of 1908. “You are about to witness the most spectacular feat ever attempted by the greatest daredevil in the world: The Great Jensen!”

The crowd roared approval as The Great Jensen (nee Jensen Ross Ackles of Richardson, Texas[1]) smiled and waved, his teeth nearly outshining his white sweater, trousers, and boots. Behind him, his best friend and assistant, Jared Padalecki, watched proudly while Brad Creaser and Jim Michaels, their trusted technicians, checked over the hot air balloon.

Then a lady ran out of the crowd to kiss Jensen, and Jared had to pry her off of him so that he could get ready for the stunt. She looked vaguely familiar, and Jensen thought she must be one of those women who traveled to every one of his shows, no matter where they were. Jared could handle those women most of the time, but every once in a while, Jensen wondered whether they might both need another bodyguard, like that fellow Clif they’d met up in Vancouver. Not that he ever let such thoughts show on his face, mind. No, he grinned and saluted, waved to the crowd again and took his place by the balloon.

The announcer picked up where he’d left off. “He will be strapped in a straitjacket before your very eyes and lifted up into the clouds, where eagles soar and no sparrow dares to venture!”

Jensen barely refrained from rolling his eyes as Brad and Jim strapped him into the straitjacket—white, embroidered with a giant letter J in silver thread—and Jared tied a thick white rope securely around his ankles. Really, he needed to get Sera to dial back on the melodrama. The balloon wasn’t going _that_ high; if it did, he’d probably need some kind of air tank like he’d used for the deep-sea diving, and that would a) be too heavy and b) spoil the stunt.

Jared finished his knot, patted Jensen’s shoulder, and moved to the other side of the balloon while Brad and Jim secured Jensen’s arms. The drums rolled... and another lady launched herself from the sidelines to smother Jensen with kisses just as Jared cut the rope tethering the balloon to the ground. She was persistent, this one (Cindy? Nicki? He never could remember, although he had gotten her name once); it took the combined force of Brad, Jim, Jared, and the balloon to get her to let go of him. And then he was hanging by his feet as the balloon traveled skyward and the cheers of the crowd faded with distance, and Jensen could finally return his attention to the task at hand. They’d practiced enough times that he knew he was in no danger, but getting out of the straitjacket was still tricky.

At the far end of the field, a group of boxwoods detached themselves from the forest and rolled to a strategic position. From behind the mobile hedge, Jensen’s long-time rival Professor Collins (nee Dmitri Tippens Collins, known to his few friends as Misha) peered out at the scene, as did Misha’s assistant, Sebastian Roché. Misha didn’t actually twirl his handlebar mustache, but he did chuckle in a most dastardly way.

“To work, to work, Bas,” he said.

The black-clad men hurried further back behind the hedge, which concealed not only them but also a gigantic crossbow. At Misha’s direction, Sebastian cranked the crossbow to the proper elevation. Then, once the crossbow was aimed and while Jensen was still wrestling with the straitjacket, Misha straightened, took off his fuzzy beaver-skin top hat to hold over his heart, and pulled the lever. The huge red arrow flew straight and true, puncturing the balloon close to a seam. Misha and Sebastian cackled and congratulated themselves.

“There’s a hole in the balloon!” a man in the crowd cried. The women all screamed, and at least one woman fainted.

Meanwhile, Jensen finished worming his way out of the straitjacket and let it fall. He knew something had gone wrong because the balloon’s rise had stopped, but he didn’t panic. Instead, exactly as rehearsed, he grabbed the rope, righted himself, and pulled himself up the rope and into the basket of the balloon.

“He’ll never make it,” said Sebastian.

“He’ll never make it,” agreed Misha.

The hole in the balloon was now big enough that Jensen could hear the wind whistling through it, and it was growing by the second. But he hadn’t lost much altitude, so he fastened on the pack that had been hidden in the basket and stepped back up to the edge. Then he jumped out, counted seven, and pulled the cord.

There was a satisfying _thwup_ , and his fall slowed.

“A parachute!” cried Sebastian.

“A parachute!” cried Misha.

The crowd cheered and applauded, and Jensen drifted to safety, triumphantly clasping his hands above his head. Another stunt well performed for The Great Jensen!

“A parachute!” cried Misha, hitting Sebastian and throwing his hat in frustration. “A parachute!”

Sebastian poked Misha’s shoulder. “Misha?” he asked in a small voice.

“What?!”

Sebastian pointed up. The balloon was headed right toward them. Panicked, Misha and Sebastian ran about twenty yards and waited for the balloon to land.

Unfortunately, they’d run twenty yards in the wrong direction. It came down smack on their heads.

* * *

“Lay-dees and gennelmun!” yelled the announcer over the murmur of the crowd that had gathered between the grandstand and the airplane. “You are about to witness a feeeeeat so dangerous that only one man would dare attempt it: the magnificent Professor Collins!”

There was a perfunctory cheer, and Misha nodded and bowed to the crowd while holding open his batwing cape to reveal his white harness, which stood out against the stark black of his suit. Then he motioned to Kevin Parks and Victor Landrie, his technicians, and ordered them to attach the hooks on the cable that was suspended from the frame above him.

The announcer explained, “The Professor will defy death as his assistant”—here he pointed to Sebastian, seated at the wheel of the small airplane Misha had built himself—“swoops down from the sky, snares the Professor on the ground, and lifts him into the air!”

There was another perfunctory cheer, and Misha nodded to the crowd again.

“Contact,” called Phil Sgriccia from the rear of the airplane.

“Switch on!” replied Sebastian, switching on the engine.

Phil spun the propeller to start the motor, and he, Kevin, and Victor got out of the way while Sebastian adjusted his goggles and looked back at Misha, a good fifty yards behind him. Misha raised his hand dramatically, and Sebastian shot him the ‘okay’ sign before taking off the brake and steering the plane forward until it could take off at the edge of the field. Once he was airborne (barely), Sebastian banked and climbed as he turned to fly over the crowd, then turned again to snare the springy cord attached to Misha’s harness and start climbing.

But the airplane’s performance had never been consistent in rehearsals, although Misha preferred to blame that on Sebastian’s weak piloting skills rather than on the homemade engine. And this time the airplane had him barely ten feet off the ground at any given time.

“Up, Bas,” he yelled, “bring it up.”

“Coming up!” Sebastian returned, pulling back on the wheel hard. But the altitude didn’t change.

“Bas, up, you idiot, UP!”

“She’s up!” Unfortunately, Sebastian took one hand off the wheel to cup to his mouth, and the wheel jerked forward and the plane went down. Misha’s knees were inches off the ground.

“BAAAAAAS!”

Sebastian wrestled a little more altitude out of the plane, but it wasn’t much better than it had been before. Misha was barely level with the tops of the barren trees.

“Up, you idiot, UP!!”

“Too much weight!”

Misha was about to come up with some witty retort when he suddenly realized that they were headed toward a barn. “BAAAAAAS!”

There was little Sebastian could do. The plane cleared the roof, but Misha was so low that he swung right into the open hayloft door. The collision not only severed the cords and sent Misha crashing through the hayloft into a large bucket of chicken feathers but also caused the plane to nosedive directly into the hog wallow in front of the barn. Stunned by the impact, Sebastian could only weakly push up his goggles and let the putrid mud slide down his face as the pigs gathered around to investigate.

The barn doors swung open, and Misha staggered forward, chuckling madly and spitting out feathers. “I’d like to see The Great Jensen try that one,” he said to no one in particular and tried to laugh, but it came out as a wheeze as his eyes rolled back and he fell backward in a cloud of feathers, unconscious.

* * *

Nobody really knew where this one-sided rivalry between Jensen and Misha had come from. Some said it had started in their vaudeville days on the Columbia-Warner circuit, when they and Jared and Sebastian had been part of a troupe presenting a horror production called _Supernatural_. Jared and Jensen had been the stars, playing the demon-hunting brothers Sam and Dean Winchester, while Sebastian had gotten all the laughs as the wayward angel Balthazar and Misha had played Dean’s straight-laced guardian angel, Castiel. Casting Misha against type and as the foil to all-American nice guy Jensen, who was both better looking and a better actor, had driven Misha over the edge, according to Rob Benedict’s gossip columns. There was some talk of pranks gone awry, but Aldis Hodge, one of their supporting players, swore that the practical jokes had been _Jared’s_ purview, never pulled for spite, and that Jensen had always called a halt to the prank wars if they looked likely to get out of hand. In any case, when the show had ended after ten years and Jensen had gone off on the carnival circuit, Misha had dogged his footsteps, determined to come up with some kind of stunt that Jensen couldn’t top.

But Misha’s stunts always went south, while Jensen not only ignored him but also effortlessly broke record after record. Misha had finally gotten so frustrated that he had decided to kill Jensen—and when the first attempt with the balloon failed, he and Sebastian went back to the drawing board.

Finally, Sebastian came up with a sound-guided torpedo, just in time for Jensen’s attempt to break yet another record in a custom-built speed boat (white and gold, naturally). While Jensen chatted with reporters, Misha towed the torpedo to the opposite side of the lake, and he and Sebastian wheeled it gingerly over the rocky shoreline to the water while Misha muttered something about “See if Jared calls _me_ ‘some stupid with a flare gun’ ever again.” Sebastian, perhaps wisely, refrained from comment.

Once they were in position and Jensen started his run, Misha asked Sebastian, “You’re sure you tested the mechanism?”

“I’m positive,” Sebastian replied. “It can’t miss. You just throw this switch, and then it hones in on the loudest engine noise.”

Misha flipped the switch, and the torpedo started to beep as the horn on the top began tracking the noise of the boat engine.

“You see? It’s picked up Jensen’s boat!”

Misha cackled in delight and flipped another switch, and the torpedo sped away toward the boat. “Farewell, Jensen!” he crowed. Then he tapped Sebastian’s shoulder and pointed toward the car. “Away!”

As the torpedo neared its target and began following the boat around the lake, Misha and Sebastian reached their car, and Sebastian began cranking the engine. It was a cheap car, however, prone to backfiring, and backfire it did now, multiple times... and, unbeknownst to them, louder than the sound of Jensen’s speed boat. They had barely made it back to the dirt road that led to the lake when the torpedo struck the back of the car, putting the wretched vehicle out of its misery and felling a pine tree at the same time.

Now, one would think that Sebastian and Misha would have learned a valuable lesson about dealing with rockets from this incident, but one would be wrong. Jensen broke the speed boat record, which left Misha only one move in his self-proclaimed war of one-upmanship: to break one of Jensen’s land speed records. He therefore built a rocket-propelled vehicle, found a disused stretch of railroad track, and alerted the press that he intended to cover the measured mile in twelve seconds. Naturally, the reporters who turned up for the demonstration laughed at him until Sebastian lit the fuse and the rockets roared to life.

As the vehicle sped down the track, Sebastian called out the speeds while Misha cackled and shouted his own greatness to the skies. They were so excited over the fact that they’d accelerated to 300 miles per hour that they failed to notice when the rocket-shaped part of the vehicle, having achieved takeoff velocity, took leave of the wheels. But suddenly Sebastian cried, “Misha!” and Misha looked to see that the sight directly in front of them wasn’t the tree-lined track anymore, but rather... a flock of geese.

They looked at each other. They slowly looked over the sides at the farmland getting further and further away. They sat up straight and didn’t dare look at anything.

And then the rockets burned out, and they screamed and clung to each other as they plummeted into the same hog wallow where Sebastian had crashed a few weeks earlier.

While the mud hissed and boiled away from the rocket and the farm animals expressed their dismay, Misha said grumpily, “Well, there’s another one Jensen can try on for size.”

Sebastian could only nod.

* * *

In his trademark white suit, Jensen paced around the table of the board meeting at the headquarters of Chevrolet. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I’ve requested this meeting in order to make you a proposition. In my opinion, your company manufactures the finest automobile in the world. The automobile represents progress in the most profound sense of the word, the ultimate example of American ingenuity and enterprise.” He paused to point to the model car sitting on the table before resuming his pacing and his speech. “This great nation cannot take a back seat to competitors like Daimler, Mercedes, Napier, Rolls Royce, De Dietrich or Panhard. Gentlemen, I propose to prove that the American automobile— _your_ automobile—is without peers.” He stopped in a dramatic pose at the far end of the table, behind the model car.

Mr. Pileggi, the chairman of the board, cleared his throat and steepled his fingers. “And, ah, just _how_ do you propose to prove that, sir?”

“A race.”

The members of the board laughed a little.

“Really, sir,” said Mr. Pileggi, “you surprise me. Automobile races are becoming most commonplace.”

“I mean a long race.” Jensen leaned forward and put his hands on the table. “A _very_ long race.”

“Buffalo to Albany? It’s been done.”

“Chicago to Cleveland,” offered another board member. “That’s been done.”

Jensen picked up the model car. “New York....” He paused, rolling the model car down the long table to Mr. Pileggi. “To Paris.”[2]

“New York to...” “Paris?!” The board members were stunned. But at least they understood that he didn’t mean Paris, Texas, and none even made the wisecrack that Jared, a native of San Antonio, had told him to expect.

Jensen looked down the table at Mr. Pileggi. “You must build an automobile to the most precise specifications—”

“Nooo,” interrupted a dark-haired man in the middle of one side of the table. He wore glasses and a goatee, but there was something oddly familiar about him, despite the thick Scottish brogue that sounded... affected. “Nooo. Absolutely no.” The man stood, and Jensen got a better look at his face—a face he’d know anywhere, given those cobalt blue eyes. “For a company of this repute, a grrreat company the likes of this, entrustin’ its entire automobile future to a man the likes of Ackles, why, it’s disreputable.”

Jensen walked up behind the guy as he continued to rant. Not many people remembered Jensen’s last name these days, which made this little tirade all the more suspicious.

“A _cheap_ carnival performer, a _fraud_ , a _trrricksterrr_....”

He turned and looked at Jensen, and Jensen grabbed hold of his goatee and pulled.

The guy yelped and followed as if Jensen were pulling a real beard. “A madman! There, there!”

“Oh, I apologize,” said Jensen, not quite convinced. “I thought you were somebody else.”

The guy ignored him. “Pullin’ it out by the roots, did you see? I warned ya. The madman! Did you see him tryin’ to pull me beard out right by the roots!” And in his indignation, he grabbed hold of said beard and gave it a sharp yank.

It came off in his hand, and Jensen’s suspicion was confirmed. It was Misha.

Misha froze as he realized he’d given himself away, then glared at everyone, jumped over the table, ran to the window, and pushed it open. “Jensen will lose,” he hissed, turning back. “Your automobile will lose. _I_ shall win!” And with a maniacal laugh, he dove out the window, only to catch himself (deliberately) on the flagpole. When the other men in the room ran to the window in horror to look out, Misha continued, “I shall build the greatest automobile in the world, and I shall win!”

Just then Sebastian pulled up directly under Misha with a trampoline-topped car and yelled, “Okay, Professor!”

“This time, it will not be Jensen,” Misha continued, “it will be I, Professor Collins! Misha the Magnificent!” And with another maniacal laugh, he let go, fell onto the trampoline... and bounced while Sebastian drove away, leaving nothing under Misha but an open manhole.

“BAAAAAAS!”

* * *

Several months later, Misha and Sebastian hovered over Jensen’s palatial estate on a tandem bicycle that powered the propeller of a dirigible. They watched as Jared brought Jensen’s sparkling white carriage—drawn by two white horses, naturally—up to the front door long enough for Jensen to get in, and they followed the carriage to the Chevrolet factory, where Jared and Jensen were headed to collect Jensen’s new car.

Mr. Pileggi made a long speech before concluding, “And it is with no little pride that the Chevrolet Motor Car Company unveils its latest and greatest achievement. Gentlemen, behold the motor car of the future!”

And the factory workers rolled out the car, which was big, luxurious, and... black? It looked wholly unlike any motor car of its day, with a solid metal top, no running boards, and a long enclosed luggage area in the back, big enough to hold a corpse (in Misha’s view). It had a self-starting engine, too, and glass windows as well as a windscreen, and the hood area was not nearly as tall as usual. It looked sleek and futuristic—not just modern, but a good fifty years ahead of its time, maybe more.

It looked, in fact, exactly like the sort of car Sam and Dean Winchester would drive if they’d lived a _hundred_ years later.

“Holy cow!” gasped Jared.

“Holy Toledo,” whispered Sebastian as the crowd surrounded the car. “Look at that car!”

“Yes,” Misha whispered back. “It’s quite a car.” And secretly he congratulated his rival on choosing a color other than white for a change.

“I’ve never seen a car like that before in my life.”

“Yes, and you never will again, either. Give me the bomb.” As Sebastian fumbled for it, Misha repeated, “The bomb, the bomb!”

Sebastian handed over the small bomb. “Misha, be careful. After you activate the mechanism, you’ve only got ten seconds.”

Misha settled the bomb on the aiming device. “I know that, I know that. Give me the cord.”

Sebastian handed him the cord to the aiming device, and Misha took aim at the car, triggered the mechanism, and dropped the bomb... which promptly caught on the front axle of the bicycle. Both men yelped, and Misha tried to dislodge the bomb, but there was little he could do without falling off.

On the ground, Mr. Pileggi was saying, “We wanted to name it the Jensen Special, after the man who inspired its creation, but he had other ideas. So, since this car is as swift as a gazelle, we call it... the Impala.”

“I’m deeply honored that you would even think of naming it after me,” Jensen replied, shaking Mr. Pileggi’s hand; but whatever he was about to say next was cut off by an explosion overhead, followed by Misha’s dirigible crashing to earth.

* * *

One dark, foggy night a couple of weeks later, Ridge Canipe dared to chalk an insult between the Keep Out signs on the intimidating front gates of Misha’s dilapidated, iron-fenced property while his buddy Colin Ford stood watch. Ridge had barely finished “Collins Loves” when Colin caught sight of Sebastian skulking back from an errand and nudged Ridge. The two boys ran away silently before Sebastian could catch them. But Sebastian was more interested in not getting caught with what he held under his cloak, and he unlocked the gates as quietly as possible and slipped inside.

In the garage, Misha was hugging himself and chuckling contentedly until Sebastian gave the coded knock on the outside door. Misha opened the door and pulled him inside with a growl. “What took you so long?”

“I had to go to the Rolls Royce agency,” Sebastian explained, setting his prize on a nearby stool. “Had to steal a spare magneto.”

“Oh, good.” Then Misha put a hand on Sebastian’s shoulder and pulled him to a better position for viewing their creation. “It’s ready.”

Sebastian smiled slowly. “Yes. Yes, it’s ready.”

Misha began circling the car, practically purring. “There has _never_ been anything like this.” It wasn’t the future freak that Jensen’s car was, nor had Misha been able to bring himself to paint it white to tweak his rival, but it was a fierce, sleek machine nonetheless, with all the latest advances (well, aside from what he hadn’t been able to steal from Chevrolet) and a number of his own innovations.

“Misha, your greatest creation.”

“Genius, work of genius! The finest parts from the greatest automobiles in the world! The Hannibal Twin-8!” And Misha proceeded to show Sebastian all of the car’s special features, controlled by push buttons on the console: a heating cone for melting snow, a scissor lift for raising the chassis above flood waters, and a small cannon for firing at attackers.

So of course, when the demonstration was finished and Misha said, “Push the button, Bas,” Sebastian tried to push the button to lower the lift and instead pushed the button that fired the cannon, bringing the garage down on top of them.

“BAAAAAAS!”

* * *

[1] The IMDb entry for _The Great Race_ gives several characters full names that never show up in the actual dialogue or credits (Leslie Gallant III, Hezekiah Sturdy, Maximilian Meen, etc.); I assume those come from the original screenplay or story, neither of which I have seen. I’ve mostly followed the dialogue as filmed except where it worked better to use “Ackles” or “Padalecki” instead of “Jensen” or “Jared”—and that means there will be references in later chapters to “Mr. Jensen” when characters don’t know he has another name. Similarly, even though I know Sebastian goes by “Seb” in real life, “Bas” fits better with lines like “Push the button, Max!” As for Misha’s given surname... well, you’ll see later why I chose that tweak.  
Also, all character slip moments, like Jensen calling Jared “Sam,” are 100% intentional.

[2] There actually was a race from New York to Paris in 1908, in which six cars representing four different countries competed. Almost none of the details about the real race appear in the movie, however, including the time of year; the real race began on February 12 and reached San Francisco on March 24, but aside from one scene putting the racers in Siberia on March 10 (which would be impossible with an accurate start date), the weather conditions and vegetation portrayed in the movie all point to a later start date, like April or May. And since this is an SPN Cinema production, I feel the story works better if I follow the movie as much as is feasible and leave historical accuracy mostly out of consideration. Complaints may be filed with Blake Edwards.


	3. Chapter 2: A New Contestant

A few days later, Jim Beaver, owner and editor of the _New York Sentinel_ , was reviewing the paper’s front-page story on the New York-Paris race when Chad Lindberg, his second in command, came into his office with a very flustered expression on his face. “Mr. Beaver?”

Jim knew right away that something was seriously wrong. Chad was always cheeky, borderline insolent, and dressed in a manner that could barely be called professional (the man _colored his nails_ , for pity’s sake), but something had rattled him into respectfulness. “What is it, Lindberg?”

“You gotta come right away.”

“Why? What’s the matter?”

“Well, it’s a young lady, sir.”

Curiouser and curiouser; Chad never spoke of women that way. “What about the young lady?”

“She’s handcuffed herself to the door.”

That explained it—the whole office knew Jim had a short fuse when it came to radical suffragettes. “Handcuffed herself to the door?”

Chad’s expression somehow got even meeker, which was unheard of but was explained by his next statement. “Of the men’s room.”

“WHAT?!” Jim exploded before he could stop himself, and Chad actually flinched.

Jim almost apologized as he raced out of the office. Chad was a hard worker with a nose for the sensational, but there weren’t many editors who were willing to look past his odd manner and sleepy eyes to let him pursue his passion. Chad also knew which of Jim’s buttons he could push safely, and this wasn’t one of them. Jim knew that Chad lived in constant fear of being fired and would never deliberately let a suffragette handcuff herself to any part of the _Sentinel_ building. But the apology would have to wait; this was an emergency.

Sure enough, the hallway in front of the restroom was crowded with _Sentinel_ employees who appeared less anxious to relieve themselves than they were to chat with the crazy suffragette. A few sharp words from Jim dispersed the crowd, leaving Jim and Chad alone in the hallway with the dark-haired woman—wearing _red!_ —who had indeed cuffed herself to the restroom door. In other circumstances, Jim might have found her attractive, but now he saw only a nuisance. His ability to be understanding of other people’s quirks went only so far.

“Now,” he said, “who are you?”

She regarded him with haughty brown eyes. “I’m a female past the age of consent. I was the first woman to edit the newspaper at my college. And I shall remain handcuffed to this door until I become the first female reporter for the _New York Sentinel_.”

“Over my dead body,” Jim growled. “Unlock those handcuffs and get out.”

“I will unlock the handcuffs when you give me the job.”

“Never.”

“Never?”

“ _Never._ ”

Chad cleared his throat. “Uh, Bossman, if she stays handcuffed to the door of the men’s room, the men....”

“The men may use the washroom on the next floor!” Jim shouted, deliberately looking away from Chad.

“Uh, Boss....”

“They can’t keep running upstairs forever,” noted the mystery woman.

Jim looked at her again. “They can until you get hungry.”

Her eyebrows arched in amusement. “Oh, that would make quite a story for your competition: ‘Woman Starves to Death in Men’s Room of _New York Sentinel_.’”

Chad snorted and coughed to pretend he wasn’t laughing.

Jim’s eyes narrowed. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“I would dare anything for women’s rights,” said she.

Jim huffed and walked away, a still-nervous Chad hard on his heels.

“Give me an assignment,” she called after them. “If I fail, fire me.”

“You’re fired,” Jim called back as he and Chad hurried around the corner and back into his office. “Lindberg, post a bulletin: Suffragettes are not permitted—”

The young woman, handcuffs still dangling from her left wrist, barged in after them. “Let me cover the Great Race!”

“It’s being covered by experienced reporters,” Jim told her truthfully.

“No, I mean really cover it, from start to finish, mile by mile.”

“Reporters are not permitted on the trip, only contestants. Those are the rules.”

“Break them!”

Jim really wanted to shoot back that the _Sentinel_ was a newspaper, not a school for revolutionaries, but with Chad standing right there, he couldn’t. “No,” he said instead.

The woman tapped one black-gloved finger on the newspaper on his desk. “Enter the race. Enter your own car.”

This retort he could voice. “We are running a _newspaper_ , not an automotive agency!”

She straightened. “Are you afraid of losing? Give me the money, and _I_ will enter the race.”

“I _despise_ suffragettes.” Jim knew it wasn’t a good comeback.

Chad snorted and put one hand up to his face so that his tinted nails were clearly visible. “Hell, he’d rather put up with _me_ ,” he drawled. And that was a better comeback, considering that Chad was also wearing only a henley and denim trousers—no vest, no jacket, nothing to distinguish him from a newsie.

“Oh, I am not just trying to get the vote for women,” she returned, stalking around Jim’s desk. “I am out to emancipate them from the drudgery of being either servants or saints.” Then she stuck her head out the window and yelled, “Out of the laundry rooms and off the pedestals!”

“You’re mad, lady,” Jim rumbled.

“And _you_ , sir, are a slave to your Puritanism,” she retorted, coming back toward his desk.

Chad shook his head. “Not helping.”

Jim blinked. Chad had given him grief about being a Congregationalist before, so he didn’t understand what the comment meant. But given the look on his face, Chad was afraid to say what he was really thinking.

Jim sighed. “If you have something to say, Chad, spit it out.”

Chad looked him in the eye. “You took a chance on me... sir.”

Jim studied Chad for a moment before turning back to the young lady, who now seemed completely confused. Then he sighed again. “Are you serious about wanting to work? This isn’t just some gimmick?”

She shook her head, and her voice held less challenge when she replied. “No, sir, I really do want to be a reporter.”

“What’s your name?”

“Harris. Danneel Harris.”

“Well, Miss Harris, your proposal regarding the Great Race will take more consideration, but if I decide that it is worth the risk to the newspaper, that will be your first assignment.”

The look in her eyes shifted further from defiance to a mixture of confusion and hope. “Does... does that mean you’ll hire me?”

Jim held up a hand. “Possibly. Right now I think you might work better for us on a freelance basis, but _if_ I enter you in the race _and_ your reporting is good, I _might_ consider making it a full-time position. What would your terms be?”

Miss Harris found her footing again. “I’d say $50 for every exclusive story of the race I send back and $100 for every photograph.”

“Sounds fair.”

She pulled a paper out of her reticule. “Can I get that in writing?”

“Not today.” She started to pout, but Jim continued, “ _If_ I decide to enter you, I’ll sign.”

She shrugged and returned the paper to her reticule. “All right. Have a cigar,” she added, pulling out a small package of them and taking one for herself.

“No, thanks. I don’t smoke.”

Miss Harris shrugged again and offered one to Chad, who declined, then lit her own and sashayed gracefully to the door. “The _Sentinel_ will scoop the world!” she proclaimed on her way out.

Jim sighed yet again. Samantha was going to _love_ this.

* * *

The _SS Anaximander_ , Misha’s private submersible, crawled through the murky waters off the beach where Jensen was testing the off-road capacities of the Impala. Misha turned the helm over to Sebastian and raised the periscope just in time to see a woman on a horse ride up to Jared. He chuckled evilly to himself.

On the beach, Jensen pulled the car to a stop in front of his elaborate Arabian-style tent and got out. Jared was watching the lovely young lady beside him suspiciously, but he waited until Jensen had exchanged flirtatious smiles and greetings with her before saying, “I don’t know what she’s doing here, Jay. She says she’s a woman with a mission, but I think she’s a spy for Professor Collins.” They had long ago agreed not to let on that they had ever been on a first-name basis with Misha.

The lady rolled her eyes and smiled more broadly. “Surely you’re not suggesting that I’m the first woman ever to seek an audience with The Great Jensen.”

Jensen wasn’t quite sure how to parse that. He knew there had always been rumors that he and Jared were lovers—most of them started by Sebastian, no doubt, given that he wouldn’t know true friendship if it cracked a baseball bat over his head—but she might just have meant that women undoubtedly sought Jensen out all the time. And that was true, even though some of the women who’d thrown themselves at him thought he was more interested in men. There was something about this lady, though, that intrigued him, and he thought it wouldn’t hurt to talk with her long enough to find out what she wanted.

So he replied, “I’m simply Jensen, and I’m at your service.”

“I’m rather thirsty. Do you have something cold?”

“I have champagne.” And he showed her into the tent.

Jared needn’t have worried about Misha spying on them, though had he looked out to sea, the bizarre behavior of a certain periscope might have entertained him. At that moment, Misha’s thumbs were trapped by the raised handles of said periscope, and he and Sebastian were trying, without much success, to get him free and to get away unnoticed.

Jensen put some romantic music on the gramophone and made a big production of selecting and serving the champagne, which seemed to bore the young lady—Danneel Harris, she introduced herself as—although she did smile politely at all the right points. Okay, so she wasn’t looking for romance, or at least not that she would admit to herself; the longer he stared into her eyes, the more interested in him she became. That still didn’t tell Jensen what her real purpose was.

Finally, after a sip of champagne, Miss Harris stated, “I’m a reporter.”

“A reporter?”

“You disapprove?”

Jensen cleared his throat. “No,” he replied truthfully. He didn’t have a problem with ladies doing their own thing unless they tried to claim to be _his_ superiors. “Let’s say I’m a bit surprised.” And that was true, too. What newspaper would hire a lady, even in 1908?

“Well, let’s be honest and say you disapprove. A woman doing a man’s job is competitive, both sexually and economically.” Before he could come up with a response to that, she continued, “You want to know why I’m here. I want to report the race, and I want to be in it. It’s as simple as that.”

Then why the hell would she come to him? “Well, it’s hardly that simple,” he returned, trying to remain polite, “but let’s discuss it, shall we?”

She smiled. “All right. Let’s discuss the whole thing, fully and completely, right from the beginning. Do you want a wife, a companion? Or just a woman?” she added with a seductive look.

So she did want him, and he found it crude to state so plainly, especially since he wasn’t sure he returned the interest. “There are certain things we shouldn’t discuss.”

“Why? Men discuss their relationships with women.”

Sebastian would... in fact, he wouldn’t shut up about them regardless of audience, and there were times Jared and Jensen had both felt compelled to apologize for the fact that the twerp even existed. It only proved the rule that both of their fathers had drilled into them from an early age and that he repeated now: “Gentlemen don’t.”

“But I’m not a gentleman. I’m a woman.”

“Indeed you are,” Jensen said without thinking. And indeed, she seemed to have the kind of combination of brains and beauty that he’d always been looking for, just not the manners.

“Then say it. What’s expected of me? I’m an emancipated woman, and you’re an emancipated man.”

She might be a woman, but she wasn’t behaving like a lady, although he refused to treat her otherwise. “There are certain things that should remain implicit between men and women.”

That baffled her. “Why?”

“Because that’s the way I was raised, and it’s the way the South has always been, and I see no reason to change.”

“All the more reason.”

“You illogical Yankee women.”

She shook her head. “Equality, real equality between the sexes bothers you, doesn’t it?”

Oh, so she was one of _those_ ‘emancipated women.’ He refused to dignify the remark with a response; instead, he got up and walked away.

She jumped up and started to follow him. “I can speak, read, and write Russian, French, and Arabic.”

“So can I, plus five other languages.”

“I can drive any car there is.”

“So can Jared.”

“I won the Women’s International Fencing Competition!” She tossed him a foil, grabbed one of her own, and struck a dramatic en garde pose.

He sighed and let her fence with him for a moment—she wasn’t bad—before disarming her and backing her down onto the divan. But he didn’t get any closer to her than that; instead, he said, “Now, if you’d won the _Men’s_ International Fencing Competition...” and put the foils away.

“Wait,” she cried, jumping up. Then she gave him a peck on the lips while not-so-subtly handcuffing him to her. “NOW we’ll talk this out!”

To prove just how serious he was about not discussing sex or marriage with a woman he’d just met, he kissed her soundly and used the distraction to ease the handcuff off his wrist and onto hers. She wasn’t a bad kisser, and he probably could have had his way with her, but he didn’t want to, not only because he wasn’t interested but also because he was old-fashioned enough to believe that sex was for marriage. So he let her go, and while she was still gasping in indignation over the handcuffs, he rang the gong to summon Jared to see her back to her horse.

Jared started to usher her out gallantly, but she yelled, “You’re afraid! You’re afraid of a real woman!”

Jared rolled his eyes and grabbed her arm—they’d both seen their share of those women, too. “All right, _chiquita_ , let’s go.”

“I’ll show you!” Miss Harris fumed. “I’ll enter the race myself. I’ll enter my own car, and I’ll beat you!” Jared pulled her outside, but she stuck her head back in for “And another thing—” before he could get her picked up and deposited on her horse.

Really, Jensen mused, it was women like that who gave feminism a bad name.

* * *

That night, back at Collins Manor, Sebastian took care of dinner while Misha consoled himself by playing Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor” on the organ as best he could with swollen, bruised, strained, and possibly even broken thumbs. Sebastian even announced the meal, a delicious-smelling roasted turkey, with the proper dramatic flair at the perfect point in the song as if he were a proper English butler instead of a washed-up vaudevillian. It really made Misha feel like a true evil overlord for a moment.

Unfortunately, stopping for dinner meant admitting to himself that he never could play the organ and that he’d been faking while the automated organ played itself. And the bandages on his thumbs were too bulky to be manageable, so he couldn’t even eat or drink properly. Sebastian meekly offered to feed him, and Misha was just about to accept when the dogs started barking.

Now, a few minutes earlier, someone had rung at the gate, and Sebastian had answered, but he assumed, as did Misha, that the female voice claiming to be a reporter for the _Sentinel_ had been a little girl trying to play a prank. But the dogs barking meant someone had gotten through the fence. Misha poked his head out the side door and determined that the dogs were approaching the garage, which caused them both to panic. The garage itself was secure, but the dogs were definitely headed toward it, so Misha headed to the door to take a look.

“You’re sure you locked the door?”

“I’m positive. Misha, be careful,” Sebastian cautioned. “If you open the door one inch, it sets off the alarm.” That morning, he had just finished hanging the last of the smoke bombs that would cause confusion should anyone try to break in, and there were other non-lethal booby traps and alarms that would also be triggered.

“I know that,” Misha replied and opened the door a crack—just in time for the intruder, a woman, to burst through the door pursued by several of the dogs, who weren’t known to be friendly with their masters any more than they were with intruders.

All hell broke loose. And somehow, in the chaos, the woman not only ended up in the elevated car but also managed to fire the cannon and bring down the garage. Again.

“BAAAAAAS!” hollered Misha.

Finally, however, the men collared the woman and escorted her none too gently to the gate, and she fought and cursed all the way out. She even told Misha to put up his dukes and threw a punch, which actually connected because Misha hid behind Sebastian but Sebastian ducked.

“You’re a flamin’ _looney!_ ” Sebastian informed her before dodging inside and locking the gate.

And what she yelled back only confirmed his opinion: “You can’t talk to me that way! _I’m a member of the PRESS!!_ ”

* * *

The morning of the race dawned bright and clear, and a huge crowd gathered at the start line to see off the six competitors. Most in demand, of course, was Jensen, who was continually getting kissed and having his hand shaken and being asked to sign autographs. Jared had to start signing autographs in Jensen’s stead just to keep people away from the car. There was so much confusion that no one saw Sebastian slipping under a number of the vehicles—not Jensen’s, of course, since Misha wanted to beat him at the finish line, but most of the lesser competitors.

And then there was a stir as a late arrival puttered in: Danneel, dressed in pink from head to toe, at the wheel of a confetti-strewn beetle-green Stanley Steamer.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Misha asked her.

“I’m an official entry,” she informed him haughtily, “representing the _Sentinel_. And since it is my job as a reporter to be there when the first car crosses the finish line, it will be necessary for me to win.” And she whacked him on the head with her parasol for good measure, which brought even more raucous laughter from the crowd.

Jared shook his head and sighed. “ _Este chica es loco_. She won’t even get as far as Albany in that Steamer.” Sure, the Stanley engine had powered a racer that held the automobile speed record over a measured mile—a record Jensen himself had set—but he and Jared had privately concurred that the production-model Steamer wasn’t much good for long-distance endurance racing, especially given the poor fuel efficiency. And this race would be taking them through deserts and arctic wastelands, both of which would be murder on a car fueled by water.

“Don’t bet on it,” Jensen returned. “That’s a very determined woman, Jared.”

Danneel finally found Jim and his wife near the bandstand. “Good morning, Sam!”

“Good morning, Danni,” replied Samantha Ferris, who had refused to take her husband’s last name.

“Have a cigar?”

“Thank you.” Samantha took one and lit it.

Danneel looked past her to Jim. “I want to thank you again for this opportunity, Mr. Beaver.”

“I had very little choice,” Jim returned, “after your conversation with my wife. I was still doing risk assessments, you know; you didn’t have to go behind my back.”

Samantha turned to him. “Jim, if you can’t be more gracious, shut up.” Then she turned back to Danneel. “It’s a great day for the cause, Danni.”

Danneel agreed, and Jim wondered, not for the first time, when his wife had gone from simply being high-spirited to being one of those women who thought equality with men meant behaving like the kind of man who wasn’t even a gentleman.

A moment later, the band played the fanfare to signal the drivers to head to their cars, and a few moments after that, the starter fired a gold-plated gun, and the competitors were off... well, all except Danneel, who needed the help of several bystanders to push-start her steam-powered car. Jensen and Misha, the frontrunners, had barely gone a mile when Sebastian’s sabotage began paying off.

They were barely past the 50-mile mark when Misha realized that Sebastian hadn’t remembered their car’s number, shortly before the engine fell out. Unlike most of the other cars, however, the Hannibal had sustained only reparable damage, though it did start pouring smoke. Misha was under the car when Sebastian doused the engine compartment with fire suppressant foam, and _of course_ Danneel happened by at exactly that moment to take a picture and send a note back to New York via bird.

“That was a pigeon,” Sebastian stated with a frown as Danneel drove away.

Exasperated, Misha stuffed the nozzle of the fire extinguisher into Sebastian’s waistband and pressed the button.


	4. Chapter 3: Go West, Young Woman

“Why the hell is your wife picketing _us_?” Chad asked as he crawled out on the ledge outside Jim’s office to get a recalcitrant pigeon.

“Because I won’t let her smoke cigars anymore,” Jim replied, following. “She _says_ it’s because Danni’s only freelance, but I know better.”

It was telling, Chad thought, that Jim had started referring to Danneel by a masculine nickname. It was also telling that he had sent Chad out to get the damn bird—not because Jim disliked Chad or thought him expendable, but because for once the fact that he was in jeans and a loose-fitting shirt meant that he was actually the best man for the job. Chad was also thin enough and tall enough to be able to reach across the gap between the window ledge and the ledge where the bird had decided to hide out without falling.

No sooner had he grabbed the bird and handed it off to Jim, however, than he heard Samantha’s voice addressing the picketers: “Why, at this very moment, the editor sits behind his desk....” She turned to look up, saw Chad, and gaped.

Chad, being well braced, waved with his free hand and yelled, “Hi, Mom!”

He wasn’t sure which was better, Jim’s laughter behind him or the look on Sam’s face. But he didn’t let his amusement distract him from getting back to the window safely.

Just about the time he ducked his head in the window, Jim read out the message: “‘ _Sentinel_ car takes lead approx. 500 mi. W of Chicago’! Lindberg!”

“I heard,” Chad replied, climbing through the window and then sticking his head back out to call down to Sam, “Hey, Sam! Danni’s in the lead!”

Sam still looked kind of sour, but some of the other suffragettes dared to cheer.

* * *

The Steamer gave out in the middle of the desert, about 100 miles from Boracho. Danneel regretted her choice of cowgirl chic, with its impractical hat and wide-legged wool overalls, as soon as she got out to try to fix the stupid thing again; the wind from driving hadn’t been cool, but it had been better than nothing, which was what she had now. She regretted it all the more as she worked and got hotter and thirstier, especially since she seemed to be getting nowhere—and her clothes weren’t all she was questioning herself on.

She shouldn’t have let Jim pick the car. She shouldn’t have been rude to Jensen. Maybe she should have just stayed in New York.

Finally, she gave up on trying to fix the car and registered her frustration by kicking the front wheel, which only proved that she didn’t have the right kind of boots to protect her feet. It was all she could do not to cry as she hobbled back to the luggage to retrieve a canteen and choke down enough tepid water to stay hydrated. And _then_ Misha and Sebastian _laughed_ at her as they blew past.

She didn’t know if Jensen would drive past if she were still vertical. She did know that he wouldn’t drive past if she weren’t. So as soon as she heard the distinctive sound of the Impala’s powerful engine, she flopped down in the road beside the car in a pretend faint.

Sure enough, Jensen stopped and got out with a canteen. “Jared,” he called, “see what’s wrong with the car.”

“Yeah, sure,” Jared replied and did just that.

Jensen dampened a handkerchief and slid a hand under Danneel’s neck as he began dabbing at her face—and the water was deliciously cool, so the moan of relief she let out wasn’t fake at all.

“Miss Harris?” Jensen said gently.

Danneel let her eyes flutter open as he eased her upright. “I must have fainted.”

“Yeah, this heat’ll get to you.”

He wasn’t exactly cradling her in his arms, but suddenly she found herself drowning in his compassionate green eyes. “Thank you for stopping,” she said a little breathlessly.

“My pleasure. May I offer you some water?”

She was tempted, since it was cool, but she was doing okay. “No, thank you. I’m much better now.”

Then Jared’s large shadow fell over them, and Jensen looked up. “Jared, can she be fixed?”

“Not a chance, Jay,” Jared replied, and he sounded genuinely sorry. “Blew a valve and a joint.”

Danneel sighed. “Well, I guess that’s the end of that.”

Jared and Jensen helped her to her feet. “I know how disappointed you must be,” said Jensen, “but it’s amazing that you were able to accomplish what you did.”

“You mean amazing because I’m a woman,” Danneel replied bitterly without thinking and immediately kicked herself for it. By rights, the Steamer shouldn’t have held up past the New York state line; she’d nursed it this far as well as anyone could who wasn’t a professional mechanic, and that was something to be proud of—or might be if the race were an endurance test in which no one got to pick his own car. But somehow, hearing those exact same points made by Jensen a moment later irritated her beyond all reason, and she couldn’t stop herself from arguing with him even as she moved her luggage to the back seat of his car.

She didn’t even know why his opinion mattered. He was an actor, a carnival performer. She was a grown woman; she didn’t need a man or a man’s opinion. And it wasn’t like she was falling for him.

She wasn’t.

She... _wasn’t_.

Finally, she climbed into the back seat with the pigeons (while her heavier bags were still on the Steamer) and then poked her head back out. “Well, what are we waiting for? Every minute wasted is another mile for Professor Collins.”

Jared and Jensen exchanged a look she couldn’t interpret and brought the luggage over to the Impala while Danneel wrote another dispatch and attached it to a pigeon. She sent the pigeon off just as the men were getting back in the car.

“We’ll take you as far as Boracho,” Jensen stated as he slid behind the wheel, “where I pick up some gasoline.”

“Perfect,” Danneel agreed.

“From there, you’re on your own.”

Part of Danneel was perfectly happy with this arrangement. Part of her wanted to stay in this back seat all the way to Paris, with Jensen and shade and cool air coming from somewhere and... and _Jensen_. She wasn’t sure which side ought to win.

* * *

If either Misha or Sebastian had paid attention to the history of places west of the Mississippi, they would have known that there had been no Indian attacks near Boracho since they were in grade school—nor any Indians, for that matter, the local band having been among the unfortunate many shipped off to the reservations in Oklahoma in the mid-1870s. But Sebastian didn’t care about history at all, and Misha cared only about the histories of places on the East Coast. So when they saw dark-faced men in feathered bonnets riding around them on horses, shooting their guns into the air and letting out war whoops, they panicked. The result was that they came into Boracho at top speed, with the chassis raised and Misha’s not-yet-patented smoke screen leaving a trail of noxious black smoke behind them.

Unfortunately, the lift put the chassis at exactly the same height as the “Boracho Welcomes the Great Racers” banner that was stretched across Main Street, and the smoke meant that they didn’t see it in time to avoid smacking into it.

Still, it wasn’t until they got stopped in the middle of a crowd in the middle of town and shook hands with an older man wearing a ribbon that said “Mayor” that they stopped panicking enough to realize that people were... laughing at them.

“What’s funny?” Misha frowned.

The mayor shook his head. “That was just Sheriff Williams and some of the men. Why, they rode out to welcome you!”

 _An odd sort of welcome_ , Misha thought, but he laughed it off. “Well, that’s very reassuring, Mr. Mayor.”

“Morgan. Jeffrey Dean Morgan.”

Misha ignored the name. “Now, if you’ll just show us where the gasoline is, we’ll be on our way, eh?”

“On your way?!”

“Yes, you see, every second counts.”

“You can’t go now!”

Misha hadn’t heard that since the first time he’d threatened to quit _Supernatural_ after losing his voice at a show in Milwaukee due to the low register in which he’d spoken Castiel’s lines. “What do you mean, we can’t go now?”

Sebastian chimed in, “We’ve got to have gas. Now.”

The mayor frowned at Misha and coughed a little because of the smoke still trickling from the back of the car. “You’re the guest of honor.”

“But I don’t wanna _be_ a guest of honor!” Misha objected.

“I shall present you with this key to the city!” the mayor continued, thrusting a huge gold-painted wooden key at Misha.

“He doesn’t want a key,” said Sebastian, as if the mayor were stupid. “He wants _gas_.”

“As mayor of Boracho—”

Misha drew himself up to his full height and thundered, “I want gas and I want it now!”

That trick had never worked on Jensen, however (mostly because Jensen was two inches taller, even barefoot, and had that moose Jared for backup), and it didn’t work on the mayor, either. The mayor, who was almost as tall as Jared, thundered back, “You don’t _get_ gas ’til tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?!” Misha and Sebastian chorused in dismay.

“You’re gonna accept this key”—the mayor shoved it into Misha’s hands—“and you’re gonna attend that meeting tonight, or by all that’s holy, you’re gonna be the guests of honor at a necktie party.”

“Necktie?” Sebastian frowned. “What kind of cheap present is that?”

Sometimes Misha was amazed at what Sebastian still didn’t know about American slang. But he ignored his minion in favor of continuing to argue with the man who’d just threatened to hang them. “Now, listen, you cheap, mealy-mouthed, third-rate ward-heeler—”

But before he could get as far as insulting the mayor’s parentage and questioning his manhood, the mayor started calling for a rope. Sebastian, ever clueless, offered the rope that was in the car before Misha shoved him back into the driver’s seat. And the mayor continued yelling for a rope until Misha bashed him over the head with the stupid key to the city while Sebastian floored the accelerator to get them out of town as fast as possible.

Meanwhile, Jensen, who did not believe in winning too easily, had pushed the Impala past his usual chosen cruising speed of 50 mph to an equally comfortable 70 mph and had more than made up the time lost tending to Danneel and her car. The last of Misha’s smokescreen had barely dissipated when the Impala approached the outskirts of Boracho, and Jared frowned. “Jay, are those—”

“Look like,” Jensen replied, sounding unconvinced.

“But that’s impossible.”

“I know.” As the bonneted riders surrounded the car, Jensen slowed down, shut off the air cooling system, and rolled down the window to yell something that wasn’t English. The ‘Indians’ looked at each other in confusion, so Jensen tried again in another language.

Finally, one of the ‘Indians’ rode up beside the driver’s window and leaned down. “Sorry, sir,” he said, “we only speak English.”

And suddenly, just about the time Jensen and Jared started to laugh, Danneel realized that the man was _black_.

“I thought the costume looked wrong,” Jensen returned. “Good joke, though! I’m Jensen.”

“Sheriff Williams,” the black man replied. “Welcome to Boracho.”

Jensen stuck his arm out the window and waved, and the ‘Indians’ whooped in reply and fell into an escort formation.

“Um,” Danneel said as Jensen rolled up the window again, “what languages were those?”

“Lakota and Comanche,” Jensen answered. “And before you ask, those aren’t written languages, and I’m not fluent, so no, they’re not among the five languages I mentioned the other day.” He looked over at Jared. “Miss Harris speaks, reads, and writes Russian, French, and Arabic.”

Jared shrugged a little. “Not bad. But you’ve got, what, Spanish, German, Italian....”

“Greek and Latin. Plus some Hebrew.”

“Right, forgot you went to grammar school.”

“And you’ve got Spanish and Polish... what else?”

“A little German, little Japanese, little Cantonese.”

“And Anglo-Saxon.”

“That’s a dead language, Jay. Doesn’t count.”

“So’s Biblical Hebrew— _and_ Latin, unless you count ecclesiastical.”

“I’m still better at math than you.”

“Whatever, smarty-pants.”

They were still bantering when they pulled to a stop in the middle of town, where the locals looked decidedly less than friendly. A number of the men were holding ropes. Even the mayor was holding a ‘key to the city,’ which looked somewhat the worse for wear, as if it were a weapon rather than a gift.

“You gonna give us any trouble?” the mayor asked as soon as they disembarked.

“I _beg_ your pardon?!” Jensen asked, more baffled than offended.

“We’ve been planning this shindig for over a week. Now do we string up the bunch of ya, or are you gonna cooperate and be the guests of honor?”

Danneel was taken aback, but even as Jared stepped in front of her protectively, Jensen rose to the occasion and raised his hat in salutation to the crowd. “Gentlemen, I greet you with cordiality and good cheer, and it’s a pleasure to be accorded this great honor.”

The mayor softened a little. “Well, there’s a big celebration tonight. You won’t get any gas until tomorrow.”

“My friends and I look forward to your celebration and the hospitality of your charming community.”

A sudden cheer went up, with some murmurs of “That’s more like it,” and all trace of hostility vanished. Danneel couldn’t suppress a quiet gasp at the change, and her hand flew to her chest.

Jared turned to her. “You all right, Miss Harris?”

She nodded a little. “How did he do that?”

Jared smiled fondly. “That’s Jensen for you.”

It was a good thing her hand was already positioned where he couldn’t see the way her heart gave a flutter at that pronouncement.

* * *

If Boracho’s town council had been trying to make the place a living stereotype, Jensen mused later that evening, he wasn’t sure he’d have seen anything different from the spectacle that was playing out in front of him in the Silver Palace Saloon. The saloon’s dancing girls were prancing back and forth on the stage and catwalk, showing off their red-clad legs and figures while singing a nasal parody of “Buffalo Gals” with lyrics beginning, “It looks to me like a big night tonight.” The men of the town ranged in dress from bowlers and suits to looking like they’d just ridden in off the range, and the women ranged in modesty from matronly to fancy women. The air stank of cigars, cheap booze, and gunpowder from celebratory gunfire. And about half of the attendees were already drunk.

It might have been colorful to someone from New York. Miss Harris seemed to be enjoying it, with the air of someone watching something quaintly amusing. But it wasn’t anything Jensen hadn’t seen fifty times a year on any of the circuits he’d played. Hell, it wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen a hundred times or more growing up near Fort Worth. He watched with enough attention to seem polite, as he knew Jared was doing for the same reason, but truth be told, he was tired and _bored_.

When the song was over, another burst of whoops and gunshots burst out until Mayor Morgan stood and quieted everyone. Then he toasted to Jensen with some tolerable champagne, and Jensen returned a toast to Boracho. Each toast was greeted with more noise than drinking. But before it could give Jensen a headache, the saloon’s master of ceremonies came out on stage to announce “the Queen of the West”—if Jensen had a nickel for every time he’d heard a singer introduced with that title, he could retire—“Boracho’s own Alona Tal!”

The curtain rose to another round of gunfire and a tinkly introduction on the tinny piano, revealing a crescent moon-shaped swing on which a blonde in a tight-fitting, off-the-shoulder yellow dress was lounging. She was pretty enough, but after only a few bars, Jensen spotted a spark of fire, of roughness in her face that suited the song she was singing, “He Shouldn’t-a, Hadn’t-a, Oughtn’t-a Swang on Me.” That sense grew stronger as she twirled her feather boa, left the swing, and sashayed down the catwalk to interact with the crowd while the song went on. It was an original composition, he suspected, that was part lament, part boast, and part warning to anyone foolish enough to want to start a fight in Boracho, especially one that involved any of the women present. And he found himself enjoying it. While the West was changing to meet the new conditions of the new century, frontier women were still as tough as their men and a force to be reckoned with, and he saw no reason not to celebrate that spirit.

In _Supernatural_ ’s second year, its creator, Eric Kripke, had toyed with the idea of incorporating a storyline involving a frontier saloon like this one, run by a mother and daughter; the daughter, Jo, was to have been a love interest for Dean. Unfortunately, the theater owners back East found the idea a little too blue, so the story was nixed.[1] Now, however, with Miss Tal headed to their table to flirt with them, Jared and Jensen exchanged a look, and Jensen knew Jared was thinking the same thing he was: she would have made an excellent choice to play Jo.

Then he glanced over at Miss Harris, who was just about to get a faceful of feathers flung heedlessly by Miss Tal, and saw an unmistakable flash of jealousy in Miss Harris’ dark eyes. She hid it swiftly, and anyone else could have written it off as simple annoyance at Miss Tal’s carelessness—if carelessness it was and not disdain. Miss Harris was, after all, wearing a black décolleté dress that was actually the latest thing from Paris but could, in this setting, be mistaken for the clothing of a fancy woman. And there may have been an element of semi-conscious tension caused by two beautiful women sharing the spotlight at such an event, especially given that Miss Tal was clearly Boracho’s long-standing _prima donna_ and Miss Harris was proud of her status as a pioneering female journalist. But Jensen had gotten to know his competitor slightly at the overnight stops to this point, in addition to their first encounter on the beach; and he’d observed that, at least to this point, she’d never minded other women being present or attracting attention unless they were turning their own attentions toward _him_. And Miss Tal was doing everything she could to turn his head now, up to and including throwing her boa around his neck and physically pulling his head with it.

The tension grew even more obvious after the song, when Miss Tal came to their table, said hello to all the men but very pointedly ignored Miss Harris, and then dodged Jensen’s attempt to kiss her hand by throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him square on the mouth. Miss Harris just as pointedly retouched her lip gloss and perfume, but when Jensen invited Miss Tal to join them, she insisted on sharing Miss Harris’ chair because it was next to his... and the two women glared daggers at each other before he proposed a toast to Miss Tal, which turned her attention back to him. And then she grabbed Miss Harris’ glass to drink the toast!

Jensen didn’t know whether to be amused or exasperated by the whole thing.

At the bar, meanwhile, one of the men of the town stated gruffly, “It’s lucky Texas Matt ain’t around. He’d gun that dude for sure.”

That caught the attention of Misha and Sebastian, who had slipped back into town in disguise. Misha had sneaked in to keep an eye on Jensen, and Sebastian had joined him after locating the gas.

“Pardon me, Mr. Partner,” Misha said in a fake Western drawl. “Who is this Texas Matt?”

“Who’s Texas Matt?!” the man echoed incredulously. “The roughest, toughest, meanest gunslinger in these parts. Alona’s his girl.” And he turned back to watching the festivities.

Misha and Sebastian chuckled evilly to each other, having the same idea at the same time.

“Are you a native of Boracho?” Jensen was asking Miss Tal at that moment in an attempt at neutral small talk.

But Miss Tal looked offended. “I ain’t no native! I was born here!”

Jensen kept smiling, but he glanced at Jared in dismay. Jared, predictably, was both horrified and highly amused.

“Mr. Partner,” said Misha, “where would I find this Texas Matt?”

The man at the bar turned back to him. “He’s got a ranch about eight miles south of town.”

Misha thanked him, and he and Sebastian turned to leave. But just as they reached the door, and while Alona was taking her leave of Jensen with another long kiss, two burly guys pushed the swinging doors open to make way for a third burly guy who was following a tall dark-haired man with a long dark mustache, wearing a Mexican-style hat and buckskin coat along with two Colt pistols, the combined effect of which made him look like a real mean hombre. And a hush fell over the saloon.

“Texas Matt!” someone breathed, and everyone got out of his way.

Alona peeked over the top of her boa-covered arm, which was still around Jensen’s neck, and gasped. “ _Matt!_ ”

Looking distinctly displeased, Texas Matt and his men strolled toward the center of the room.

Sheriff Williams walked over to intercept him. “Now, wait a minute, Matt. This here’s a friendly celebration.”

“Fiddle-dee-dee!” said Texas Matt. “I don’t much like the way you’re celebratin’. So you just step back, Sheriff, less’n you wanna... fall back.”

Alona rushed over and threw her arms around Texas Matt’s neck. “Howdy, Matt, honey!”

Texas Matt reached up, removed her arms from his neck, and pushed her away, sending her stumbling backward into a nearby table. She and the table collapsed, and Jensen came over to help her to her feet.

“Now, Matt, honey, don’t get riled!” Alona pleaded, pointing at Jensen as she ran back to Texas Matt. “He’s the guest of honor!”

“Of what?” Texas Matt scoffed and shoved her away again.

Jensen decided it was time to intervene. “Now, just a moment,” he said, walking up to Texas Matt.

Texas Matt pulled his hands aside, and the man standing behind him pulled both of Matt’s guns and pointed them at Jensen.

Jensen held out his hands. “I’m afraid, sir, you have me at a disadvantage. As you can see, I am unarmed.” That wasn’t entirely true—one habit he’d picked up from playing Dean Winchester was to keep a small gun in a holster hidden in the top of his boot and a couple of knives in his sleeves—but he wasn’t carrying more than his usual concealed weaponry.

“He’s unarmed!” Texas Matt repeated to the man holding his guns and punched Jensen square on the jaw, sending him stumbling backward.

Jared threw a punch at Texas Matt, who ducked. The man behind him took the punch, but the other two men with Texas Matt ganged up on Jared and knocked him down.

“Let’s get the gas,” Sebastian whispered.

“Not yet,” Misha replied, enjoying the spectacle far too much.

Then Texas Matt straightened and turned around to address the crowd. “All right, now. C’mon, now, ever’body stand back an’ give a man some fightin’ room!”

In so doing, however, he left his guard down and turned straight into a punch from Jensen. Jensen then fended off a three-way attack from Texas Matt’s men, only to have Texas Matt pop up and slug him again.

“Now will you give me some fightin’ room?” Texas Matt asked the crowd.

Suddenly a man who’d been at the bar got brave and hit Texas Matt, only for one of Matt’s men to hit him hard enough to throw him through a decorative post. Then another of Matt’s men decided to start clearing more space the hard way... and just like that, the brawl was on, with mirrors and windows shattering and bottles, spittoons, and furniture flying in addition to fists (yet no bullets or blades). Danneel took notes as best she could and even went out to the car for her camera, but it soon became almost impossible to keep track of who was where and who was fighting whom, though Alona did succeed in giving Matt a black eye. Soon after that, the building began sustaining serious structural damage, and although Danneel thought she’d be safe setting up her camera on the catwalk, someone accidentally knocked both her and the camera off the side of the catwalk to the floor, ruining the camera.

“ _Now_ look what you’ve done!” she wailed at Jensen as he helped her up.

“Me?!” Jensen returned, baffled, before the fighting swept them apart again.

Then Danneel caught sight of Misha and Sebastian, who saw her and started heading for the door. She started to follow but passed Alona, who was fighting like a wildcat, and decided to take the opportunity to kick her short-term rival in the rear. Meanwhile, Misha and Sebastian slipped outside and yelled for the deputies guarding the gas depot to come help restore order at the saloon. Once the coast was clear, they hurried into the depot, gathered up armloads of gas cans, and brought them to the gate. Then Misha sent Sebastian to get the Hannibal.

They never saw that Danneel had followed them far enough to see what they were up to and had decided to do something about it.

Once Misha and Sebastian had filled the Hannibal’s tank and loaded up as many cans as the Hannibal’s luggage area would hold, there were still seven cans left. Sebastian offered to put the remaining cans in the back seat, but Misha insisted on destroying them with the cannon rather than wasting further time hauling the gas to the car. The result was that Jensen got in one last shot at Matt before running outside with Jared to see the depot in flames and the Hannibal roaring past the saloon with Misha laughing maniacally behind the wheel. Rather than immediately taking off after Misha, however, Jared and Jensen led the men of the town in racing to put out the fire.

Twenty miles or so down the road, Misha paused to look back in fiendish glee at the firelight still brightening the night sky.

“Well, that finishes Jensen,” said Sebastian.

“Oh, no,” Misha replied. “Not Jensen. Never Jensen. He’ll think of something—but we’ll be in Alaska by the time he does!”

His cackling was cut short by the sound of pigeons cooing. He and Sebastian looked at each other, then down into the back floorboard... where Danneel smiled up at them apologetically.

* * *

[1] Vaudeville was supposed to be clean, respectable entertainment, safe for ladies and families, so theater owners and managers kept a pretty tight rein on the content of acts that appeared on their stages. Information on profane or risqué material that needed to be censored was sometimes given to acting troupes in a blue envelope, hence objectionable content in general being called “blue.”


	5. Chapter 4: A Cooling of Hostilities

Danneel spent an uncomfortable night sacked out in her best dress on a boulder, which was at least reasonably clean and free of grass and stickers, unlike the ground. Come sunrise, she redid her hair and makeup, found her black parasol, and perched artistically on the boulder again with parasol and fan, waiting for a horse-drawn Impala to trundle her way.

The Impala came her way, all right. But the only horses powering its wheels were... the horses under the hood.

Jensen hadn’t been out of gas after all.

Fortunately, the Impala was loud enough that Danneel had gotten over her shock by the time Jensen stopped and got partway out, and she was still able to make a show of ignoring him.

“I’m offering you a lift,” he said after a moment. When she continued to ignore him, he added, “Or would you prefer an engraved invitation?”

She shrugged. “I might consider an apology.”

Jensen blinked. “An apology?! For what?! It’s twenty miles back to Boracho; you’d never make it.”

“Well, that’s _your_ fault.”

“ _My_ fault?”

“I warned you I would not be left behind in Boracho. You left me no choice, so I had to stow away in the back of Collins’ car.”

“And he kicked you out.”

“And if you had taken me as far as Grommett, where I could have caught a train, it never would have happened.”

“Grommett is a hundred miles out of our way.”

 _Is_ , not _was_. Danneel tried not to let her surprise show; her carefully considered blackmail plot might not work after all. “And where are you going now?”

“Billings.”

That was one shock too many. “ _Billings?!_ But don’t you need....”

“Gas? Not yet. My baby’s got better gas mileage than most; we’ve still got, oh, a tank and a half left in the trunk after we filled up this morning.” Jensen leaned forward against the top of the car. “There’s also a train station in Billings.”

Danneel looked away and fanned herself, trying to play coy.

“I will take you that far and no further.”

That might still work; at least she had the day to consider another way to coerce Jensen to keep her with him. Danneel smiled and held out a hand, and Jensen came to help her down off the boulder.

Yet the day passed without Danneel figuring out any potential leverage to hold over Jensen. He and Jared were perfect gentlemen, conversing with her amiably about safe, polite topics, so she almost hated to have to plot to stay with them. But she had to. She _had_ to make it to the end of the race.

Jensen’s company and the luxury of the Impala were... simply added amenities.

* * *

The Impala and her occupants got to Billings late that evening, only to discover that the Collins car had arrived several hours earlier and had pushed on after picking up the next load of gas. The train east didn’t leave until morning, however, so the trio gratefully accepted the hotel rooms that had been reserved for them.

As Jensen was preparing for bed, however, Jared went to the window and watched something for a moment, then said, “Jay.”

Jensen joined him and caught sight of a slender figure circling the Impala, examining it from every angle. The individual then stopped, straightened, and put her hands on her hips in exasperation before looking around and hurrying off toward the part of the train station where the gas was stored. Jensen snorted.

“ _Ella es una mujer loca y traicionera_ ,” Jared sighed.[1]

“Not really. Just determined, like I said.” And Jensen turned and started back toward the bed.

“You don’t _trust_ her, do you?”

“Hell, no. But I don’t underestimate her. She wants something. I’m not sure even she knows what it is.” Jensen turned back to Jared, who was now watching him instead of Miss Harris, and pointed at him. “But until she figures it out and gets it, she’s going to make life hell for both of us.”

Jared narrowed his eyes a little, crossed his arms, and leaned back against the window frame. “So what should we do about it?”

The corner of Jensen’s mouth curled upward. Jared’s eyes narrowed further as he replied with a devious smile. And just like that, their plan was made.

* * *

“You D. Harris?” the bored station attendant asked without looking up from his clipboard the next morning when Jensen, Jared, and Danneel went to collect their gas.

Jensen blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“The gasoline’s consigned to D. Harris.”

“What?!” The gas wasn’t supposed to require a signature—but Danneel had broken into the station the night before and, after checking the duty roster and finding that the attendant on duty this morning had fortunately just come back from a two-week vacation, had carefully prepared the paperwork to make sure that it wouldn’t be released to anyone but her.

“Oh, I’m D. Harris,” Danneel said brightly and began digging in her reticule.

“You got some identification?” the attendant asked.

“My press card,” she answered and presented it with a flourish.

The attendant looked at it, then handed it back with the clipboard. “Okay, just sign on the line.”

“What if I don’t sign?”

“Look, lady, you don’t sign, you don’t get no gas.”

Jared rounded on Jensen, arms spread. “What did I tell you? I _told_ you not to trust her!”

Eyes narrowed, Jensen turned to Danneel.

Undaunted, she raised her chin and looked him in the eye. “Well, Mr. Jensen, you wish to continue the race. So do I. As far as the West Coast?”

Jared pulled off his hat. “If she goes, I stay!” And he stormed off down the platform.

“Jared!” Jensen chided, but Jared didn’t come back. Then Jensen turned back to Danneel. “Miss Harris....”

She shrugged. “The gas is yours if you take me to the West Coast. Under the circumstances, I consider that a fair exchange.”

The attendant turned to the porters. “Load the gas on the train.”

“Excuse me,” Jensen interrupted.

The attendant turned back to him. “She’s not signin’, and the train leaves in five minutes.”

“Just one moment, please, sir.” Jensen turned back to Danneel. “I will not leave without Jared.”

Danneel sensed her opening. “If I can change his mind?”

Jensen considered. “All right.”

She signed the paperwork quickly and handed the clipboard back to the attendant.

“Suppose you don’t change his mind?” Jensen asked her.

“Well, then, I shall take this train back to New York.” With that, she hurried down the platform after Jared, who was now sitting on a bench at the far end with his arms crossed, sulking. “Mr. Padalecki, I understand how you feel, but I beg you to reconsider.”

He turned away from her. “A deal’s a deal.”

She sighed. “Well, then, I suppose I’ll have to hurry or I’ll miss my train. Goodbye, Mr. Padalecki.”

He frowned. “You mean....”

“Well, a deal is a deal. It’s been wonderful knowing you.” She held out her hand.

He turned back to her. “What about the gas?”

“I signed for it.”

He stood and took her hand, shaking it warmly. “Oh, well, I’m sorry. You see, this race is no place for a lady.”

“I understand.” She kissed his cheek. “Would you take me to the train?”

“Oh, yes, ma’am!”

Back at the Impala, Jensen had a crowd of children helping him load the gas into the trunk and was distractedly trying to explain some of the car’s features to them when the train pulled out. He looked down the platform and saw... Miss Harris, coming back toward him alone, looking somewhat shamefaced.

“He just wouldn’t listen,” she said when he crossed his arms and walked up to her. “I told him, but he said that... uh... he’s had enough, and he didn’t think you could win anyway, so... he was going to go back to New York.”

On the train, however, Jared smirked and picked the lock of the handcuffs she’d slipped around his wrist and the back of a seat while kissing him goodbye, then called for the conductor. Not for nothing had he and Jensen been acclaimed for a decade as the greatest actors on the Columbia-Warner circuit. Everything was going _exactly_ according to plan.

* * *

From Billings, the race route ran west to Seattle, north to Vancouver, and then around the eastern side of the mountains on British Columbia’s coast to a pass that the cars could cross to get to Alaskan territory.[2] After the wild celebration Jensen’s arrival occasioned in Tonsina, Danneel dispatched the last of her pigeons back to New York (where Sam and her suffragettes had just gotten themselves arrested for blocking traffic in front of the _Sentinel_ building by countermarching in circles and waving picket signs while chanting “We want jobs! We want jobs!”). Misha, meanwhile, had attempted a number of shortcuts that made for very long delays and lost all the time he’d gained by his sabotage in Boracho and then some, arriving in Tonsina almost eight hours after Jensen did.

The next stop was supposed to be Valdez, where a ship was waiting to take the racers across to Siberia. Barely had the Impala passed Tonsina Lake, however, when a blizzard swept down from the north, and within an hour Jensen was reduced to navigating by watching his odometer while Danneel juggled the compass and the map. One or both of them somehow miscalculated, however, or perhaps the blizzard’s own magnetic field was strong enough to mess with the compass, because Jensen stopped the car in what he hoped was the center of Valdez just as the snow let up enough that they could see that they were in the middle of a barren ice flow.

Jensen sighed heavily and shut off the engine. “It’s no use. We’ll never make it to Valdez in this, especially if the wind gets any worse. We’ll have to camp here.”

Danneel was shivering, despite her heavy fur coat and the fact that the heater had been running full blast. “D-d-d-do you need t-t-to t-t-tie down the c-c-car?”

“Nah, she’s got a low enough profile, and she’s heavy enough, that I don’t think we’re in danger of blowing away. Besides, the less often we open the doors, the less heat we’ll lose.”

She groaned and gave a hard, almost convulsive full-body shiver just as the wind and snow picked up again to complete whiteout levels.

“Look, Miss Harris, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea, but we’ll stand a better chance out here if we cover up under the same blanket. I’ll respect any boundary you want to draw, but if we share body heat... we’ll just do better, that’s all.”

She nodded and inched closer to the middle of the seat while he unfolded a thick woolen blanket and spread it across their laps. Then he scooted over beside her and wrapped his right arm around her shoulders while pulling the blanket over their heads with his left hand.

Almost instinctively, she put her head on his shoulder and let out a shuddering breath. “I’ve n-n-never been s-so c-c-c-cold,” she whispered—in a surprisingly Southern stutter, and she cursed the cold for causing her native accent to slip out.

He gently pulled the edge of her hood further forward to cover more of her cheek. “Aren’t you used to the winters in New York?”

“’M not f-f-from N-N-New York,” she confessed. “I’m f-f-from... Laf-f-fayette, L-L-Louisiana.”

“... Seriously?”

She nodded jerkily. “C-c-c-couldn’t take... b-b-bein’ ’spected t-t-to be a... g-good S-Southern belle, s-stay h-home an’... c-cook an’ c-clean.”

“No. No, I can see why. You’re made for greater things than that.”

She looked up at him, not sure how to react. “H-how d-do you m-mean?”

His smile was small, but there was nothing but sincere regard in his eyes. “You’re here.”

“Oh,” she breathed, suddenly lost in that sea of green, so close, so kind, his breath so warm, driving away the chill from her suddenly flushing cheeks....

And then something hit the trunk, shattering the moment.

“What the—” He caught himself before he could swear and pulled the blanket off their heads so he could look out the back windshield.

She turned to look, too, and caught sight of a startled Professor Collins staring into the car before rolling off the trunk and running away.

“Why, that....” Jensen censored himself again.

“D-do you n-need....”

He hesitated for a moment, but then they could hear the crackling, creaking sound of the Hannibal’s chassis lowering, and he shook his head. “No. Sebastian’ll find him. They’ll be all right. Just... guess we should lock the doors, in case they forget which car’s theirs.” And he reached over to lock his door.

She did the same, but her arm was shaking so badly, it took three tries to hit the lock.

He sighed. “Miss Harris, you’re freezing. Let’s let them worry about themselves and get covered back up.”

She nodded and curled up against his chest as he raised the blanket again. “S-s-so t-tired....”

He rubbed her back. “Hey, now. Stay with me. Can’t fall asleep until you’re warmer. You go hypothermic, and... well... that boundary line might have to move so I can get you warmed up.”

“H-h-how?”

“Skin-to-skin contact’s the best. One time up in Minnesota, I fell in a lake in the middle of winter—forget why—and Jared had to strip us both down to our skivvies and sleep in my bed with me all night to get me out of danger. Talk about embarrassing.”

“W-w-was it?”

He chuckled. “You’ve never been cuddled by a 6'4" octopus.”

That startled a laugh out of her.

Before the conversation could continue, however, there were two more thumps on the trunk, followed shortly by the back door on Danneel’s side opening, the car shaking twice, and the door closing again. Jensen pulled down the blanket once more to reveal Professor Collins and Sebastian, looking half-frozen and terrified, shivering in the back seat.

“My apologies,” said Collins. “There’s a polar bear in our car.”

Jensen raised an eyebrow. “Right.”

Sebastian nodded so hard, Danneel thought his head would fall off. “Great big bear. Swear. Honest.”

“And the Cubs will win the World Series.”[3] Jensen snorted. “Get out.”

Collins stared. “But Jensen, polar bears—”

Jensen leaned against the back of the seat, eyes narrowed. “If y’all don’t leave this car right now, I will _personally_ feed you to the bear.”

Collins’ eyes grew even more shocked and fearful. “If the bears don’t get us, we’ll certainly freeze to death out there!”

“As far as that goes, y’all have the same chance we have.”

“Not if you put us back out in the blizzard!”

“At these temperatures, there’s very little difference between the blizzard out there and in here.”

“Except that you have blankets!”

Fully realizing that Collins was untrustworthy, Danneel still found herself feeling sorry for him. “H-he’s right,” she interrupted before Jensen could say anything else.

He turned to her, incredulous. “Miss Harris, you’re not suggesting that I—”

“W-well, if t-two in a blanket s-stand a b-better ch-chance than one....”

“Then four in a blanket, well,” Collins shrugged.

“He’s a cheat and a liar,” Jensen reminded her.

“That’s beside the point!” Collins objected in a quavering voice.

“Beside the point,” Sebastian agreed. “The point is that we’re freezing.”

Danneel nodded. “And the t-time has c-come to c-cast aside our p-personal d-differences.”

“Bury the hatchet,” Collins supplied.

But Jensen didn’t look away from Danneel. “And you know who has the hatchet.”

Collins snarled, but Sebastian leaned forward, pleading, “He doesn’t have a hatchet, I promise you. He doesn’t even have a whole mustache. Now, why can’t we settle this whole thing underneath the blanket?!”

Jensen sighed. “There’s a blanket right beside you, Sebastian. Use that one.”

“But—four—”

“I know you, remember?”

“Jensen—”

“Now, you listen to me, punk,” Jensen growled, rearing up like he was about to jump over the seat and throttle Sebastian. “I will grant that having four of us in this car will raise the temperature enough that we aren’t likely to freeze. But you and Misha are going to stay in that back seat and keep your filthy mitts to yourselves and remember that there’s a lady present. _Do I make myself clear?_ ”

Sebastian gulped, nodded, and grabbed the blanket next to him.

As Jensen settled warily back into his seat, Danneel struggled desperately to cover the way his fierce protectiveness had affected her. She glanced at Collins, then did a double-take as she saw that Sebastian had told the truth about his mustache.

“What’s the matter?” Collins asked grumpily. “Something wrong?”

“W-what happened to your m-mustache?” she asked.

“I broke it off,” Sebastian admitted.

Jensen blinked. “You _what?_ ”

“I broke it off. It was frozen. Look.” And he reached up and snapped off the other half of Collins’ mustache, eliciting a yelp from Collins.

Disgusted, Jensen pulled the blanket up over his and Danneel’s heads and pulled her close once more, almost like he was daring anything to take her from him. And she found herself melting into his embrace.

* * *

Jared, meanwhile, had gotten off the train at the next stop east, caught the next train to Seattle, and taken a steamboat north to Valdez, arriving well over a week ahead of the racers. Once word came that they’d reached Tonsina, he’d made preparations to confront Miss Harris at the celebration in Valdez the following night. But then the blizzard blew up, and he spent the day trying unsuccessfully not to worry about Jensen and Miss Harris. The next day dawned bright and clear, and he hoped the racers would find their way to Valdez quickly from wherever they’d had to stop to wait out the blizzard. But the day passed without the arrival of Jensen _or_ of Misha.

As it happened, however, Valdez had been chosen as the departure point for sailing to Russia not only because it was a good port but also because Jensen had friends there, including the owners and proprietors of Kane-Welling Aerial Search and Rescue. Chris and Tom had gladly let Jared stay with them to avoid publicity, and when the second morning after the blizzard dawned with no sign of the racers, they could tell how anxious Jared was for his best friend’s safety.

“Look, Jared,” Chris said over breakfast, “we know that Jay left Tonsina, what time the blizzard hit, and which way he was headed. That limits the search area, even if he got lost. Why don’t I take the plane out and see if we can’t find him?”

Jared frowned. “Can you do that? I mean, it’s not too cold or anything?”

Chris shrugged. “It’s actually warmed up quite a bit since yesterday. And you said the car’s black—well, unless it’s buried under a snow drift or something, that should be pretty easy to spot from the air.”

“True,” Tom agreed, “and there are towns he could have reached yesterday even if he did get lost—Anchorage, for sure, or even Yakutat or one of the towns on the Yukon side of Chilkat Pass. You and I can stay here and work the telegraph while Chris searches the mountains.”

Jared nodded. “That sounds good. Thanks.”

But neither avenue yielded any results before Chris had to return around midday to refuel the biplane. He hadn’t seen anything that looked even remotely like a car buried under the snow, and none of the towns in telegraph range had seen the Impala or the Hannibal. Jared was about to despair as Chris and Tom dragged him to a café for dinner, where they ran into Capt. Olsson, owner of the ship Chevrolet had engaged to ferry the racers.

Capt. Olsson shook his head sadly when Jared brought him up to speed. “God be with ’em,” he sighed. “Though it’s not as if we could have left yesterday anyway—that blizzard calved so damn many icebergs, we couldn’t have made it out of port.”

Jared’s eyes widened. “Icebergs. _Icebergs._ Chris, is there any chance....”

Chris nodded slowly. “There are several glaciers between here and Anchorage that they could have stopped on that would have calved. Of course, the odds of one being big enough to carry the car away with it are—”

“Man, we’re talking about _Jay_ here. The Great Jensen, the luckiest devil ever to barnstorm on the carnival circuit. Forget the odds. Is there any chance at all that he’s out there on an iceberg headed to Siberia?”

Chris and Tom looked at each other and sighed. “There’s a chance,” Tom replied. “A slim one, very slim, but it’s a chance.”

“Could you find him from the air?”

Chris shook his head. “Oh, no. No way in hell am I flyin’ out over open water.”

“Icebergs don’t usually travel more than a mile or two per hour,” noted Capt. Olsson.

“Once they’re out at sea, sure. How far would the tide carry one out of the bay?”

“Well—”

“Look, look, even if we do assume that’s the average speed, it’s been what, 48 hours already? That probably means they’re already out of Prince William Sound. I cannot search past the islands in a plane that’s not designed for emergency landings in water!”

Jared held up his hands before a real argument could break out. “All right, all right, an air search is out. Assuming we’re right and assuming Jay’s luck will hold out, will an iceberg the right size make it to Russia in one piece?”

Capt. Olsson grimaced. “Might be a close shave.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“There’s a chance.”

“Good enough. Where would it go?”

“Now, how in the hell would I know that?”

“ _Guess!_ ”

Capt. Olsson sighed. “If it sticks close to the Aleutians... most likely Ust-Kamchatsk.”

“Ust-Kamchatsk. Okay. How fast can you get me there?”

“Mr. Padalecki—”

“Dammit, Olsson, just _get me there!_ ”

Tom’s eyes narrowed. “You sure you’re all right, Winchester?”

“Yes,” Jared snapped—and then realized what name he’d answered to. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Sorry, Tom. It’s just....”

“He’s your brother. Not in blood, but in all the ways that matter.”

Jared nodded.

“Well, for what it’s worth, Jay always said the same about you. And I saw you two on stage together a couple of times, before Chris and I moved up here. If I hadn’t known you weren’t blood kin, I’d never have guessed.”

Jared tried to smile, but it wasn’t much more than a twitch. He was fighting too hard not to panic.

And Capt. Olsson relented. “All right. How about this: We sail with the tide, head up to the north side of the Aleutians, and run slow and keep our eyes and ears out. Even if they’re on the south side, we’d still be in range of a light signal. And that ought to keep us at a reasonable speed for avoiding other icebergs.”

Jared took a deep breath and let it out again. “Yeah. That... that sounds reasonable.”

“Fine. I’ll make arrangements after we eat.”

Eating faster wouldn’t make the tide come in any sooner, Jared knew, but that didn’t stop him from wolfing down his food.

* * *

[1] She’s one crazy, double-crossing woman.

[2] The movie doesn’t give sufficient clues as to how the racers got to Alaska, whether they were attempting the driving route across the frozen Bering Strait that was proposed for the real race (!), or where they got off course... but doggonit, this is my AU, and it’s not supposed to be historically accurate, so I’m making up my own route that splits the difference between the film route and the real route. So there.

[3] For the non-baseball fans: They did, for the second year in a row—and haven’t won it since, giving them both the first consecutive World Series wins and the longest drought in Major League Baseball. Their last World Series appearance was in 1945, when they lost to the Detroit Tigers. (And there really was a polar bear in the car.)


	6. Chapter 5: Tangled Webs

When at last the _SS Borealis_ was able to set sail, Capt. Olsson took pity on Jared and ordered the ship to proceed out of Prince William Sound as fast as safely possible. The ship caught up with the tail end of the string of icebergs within a couple of hours, and Jared waited by the heliograph as the communications officer sent out signal flashes. An anxious hour passed before a reply finally came: _TONIGHT._

Jared frowned. “‘Tonight’? What does that mean?”

The communications officer flashed something else and received the reply, _WAIT, JARED._

Jared almost collapsed in relief. His hunch had paid off.

The sun set late this far north at this time of year, and full dark was even later. By that time, the ship’s crew had been able to triangulate the location of the flashes and weigh anchor ahead of the iceberg’s path, out of visual range but still within heliograph range. And the moon was full that night, so the heliographs could still be used. Even so, Jared felt like the evening dragged on interminably before Jensen finally hailed the ship with what looked like the Impala’s headlights and confirmed Capt. Olsson’s calculation of his coordinates.

“Tell him to stand by to be picked up,” Capt. Olsson ordered.

 _NO_ , Jensen replied. _TOO UNSTABLE TO TRANSFER 2 CARS PLUS 4 PEOPLE MID-OCEAN. NO ROOM FOR CREW TO WORK._

“Two cars,” Jared repeated. “Well, I’ll be. Collins hitched a ride on the same iceberg.”

But Capt. Olsson wasn’t so easy to dissuade, now that he had his mind set on rescue. “We can pick up the passengers first and then deal with the cars.”

_NO. DAMN IT, JARED, PLAN B._

Jared’s eyes narrowed. “Plan B, as in... Burkittsville?”

Capt. Olsson and the communications officer looked at each other.

“Ask him that—just ‘Burkittsville.’” Jared spelled the name.

 _HOPE YOUR APPLE PIE IS WORTH IT_ was Jensen’s answer.

Jared laughed and turned to Capt. Olsson. “He wants us to meet them there. I don’t know what he’s got cooking, but whatever it is, he doesn’t want the others to know we’re out here.” He could guess, of course. Since Jensen had surmised his presence on the ship, it probably had something to do with Miss Harris, either testing her mettle or cultivating whatever relationship was budding between them, or both. The non-rescue was postponing the confrontation over Billings—but not, Jared noted, cancelling it. Their cancellation codeword had always been the same as Dean’s code for being held hostage, _funky town_. Yet the reference to the killer scarecrow in Indiana proved that he was talking to Jensen, since that story predated Misha and Sebastian’s tenure with _Supernatural_.

Maybe Miss Harris wasn’t the only one with unclear desires.

In any case, Capt. Olsson was not happy. “We are not leaving them out here alone.”

“I’m not saying we have to. We can do what we did tonight—stay out of visual contact but within heliograph range so that if something goes wrong, we can answer a distress signal. That’s what I’d recommend if we’d planned this stunt.”

Capt. Olsson sighed. “All right. Let him know.”

Jensen acknowledged the transmission.

Then, with the communications officer’s permission, Jared personally sent, _JERK._

Dean’s usual reply—the blue one that Jensen had never been allowed to utter onstage—came back, followed by the _end_ signal.

“He’ll be okay,” Jared said, mostly to himself. “He’ll be okay.”

The remainder of the trip to Ust-Kamchatsk was painfully slow, lasting the better part of three weeks. And the only reason it went even that fast was that a storm blew up on about the fifth day, pushing the ice flow westward far faster than the icebergs would have drifted on their own. After that, the racers’ iceberg seemed to be caught in a current that increased its average speed to closer to 5 mph, causing Jared to wonder whether Jensen’s guardian angel—maybe even Castiel himself—were lending a hand to make sure the racers made it to port in one piece. In any case, rain or fog or shine, Jensen dutifully flashed a short message to the ship every night, and Capt. Olsson kept the ship close enough to receive it.

 _LAND TOMORROW AM?_ Jensen asked on the final night. When the ship confirmed, he sent, _SEE YOU THERE_.

“Suppose that means he wants us to go on to port,” Capt. Olsson sighed. “We’ve missed high tide, and the next one’s not until morning—but then again, port as small as this one, that doesn’t make as much difference.”

Jared shrugged. “Well, as low as they are, they won’t be able to see land until... what, 7 or 8?”

“Something like that.”

“So we can still wait for the tide and be in port well before they wake up. Jensen’s probably been letting them sleep in until 7:30, even if he gets up before then, which he will tomorrow. And in the meantime, we can stay in heliograph range just in case something goes wrong before the tide comes in.”

Capt. Olsson nodded and gave orders accordingly.

Jared slept fitfully that night and gave up around 6, shortly before Capt. Olsson came to inform him that the tide was coming in and the ship was coming in with it. He tried with limited success to restrain his impatience while the ship docked and the crew members who spoke Russian got to work coordinating the change in route and sending word back to New York (where the suffragettes had escalated their protest to sitting in the halls of the _Sentinel_ building with Sam blocking Jim’s door, which was pushing Jim to the brink of pneumonia). But sure enough, shortly after 7:30, Jared heard a blast of celebratory cannon-fire—and he wasn’t alone. Within minutes, the harbormaster had a small fleet of tugboats headed out to tow the iceberg into port.

 _Time for Plan B_ , Jared thought and positioned himself on the dock at a point where he wouldn’t be seen immediately as the iceberg pulled in. Then he watched until one of the tugboats pulled away from the rest and delivered the passengers to the dock while the rest of the workers got the iceberg well enough moored to be able to rescue the cars by crane. Misha and Sebastian immediately began yelling instructions (in English) about the Hannibal, but Jensen began escorting Miss Harris up the dock, presumably with some suggestion of trying to find a hotel where she could rest and freshen up. Jared waited until precisely the most dramatic moment to step out of the shadows and say, “Good morning, Miss Harris.”

Her look of shock and fear was priceless.

Jensen didn’t light into her right away, however. Instead, he left her in Capt. Olsson’s care while he and Jared got the Impala ashore and ready to resume the race. Only then did he ask her to join them by the car and take her to task for the stunt she’d pulled in Billings—still not letting on that they had chosen to let her get away with it this long. It might not have mattered if he had, however, given the way she kept trying to argue that it was his fault to begin with.

“You gave me your word!” Jensen finally stated.

“You gave me no choice!” she shot back.

“You lied!”

“I told you I would finish the race!”

“You used Jared; you used me. I’m beginning to think we’re no more to you than means to an end.”

“Oh, come on!”

“If you’re not willing to work with both of us as a team—”

“Now that’s not fair!”

“—and if I can’t trust you not to sabotage me any further—”

“Sabotage?! Now, look—”

“—then I’m not sure we should keep you with us any longer.”

“But you _can’t_ leave me here!”

Jared wasn’t sure whether Jensen were building up to actually leaving her on the _Borealis_ to go back to Seattle, setting up another deal to take her with them to Paris after all, or what. And he would never get the chance to find out. Before Jensen could reply to Miss Harris, a noxious black cloud rolled up to envelop the car. She screamed, and the cloud—and the Hannibal—roared away... taking her with it.

When the smoke cleared, Jensen’s face was a mask of mingled sorrow and rage, a look Jared hadn’t seen there since the last time a _Supernatural_ show involved Sam Winchester’s death. Only this time Jensen clearly wasn’t acting. He swallowed once convulsively and then wrenched open the driver’s door. “Get in.”

Jared blinked. “What?”

“Dammit, Sam, _get in!_ ”

Jared ran around to the passenger side, jumped in the car just as Jensen switched on the ignition, and slammed the door a split second before the tires spun and the Impala leapt after the Hannibal. Yet somehow, improbably, impossibly, that brief head start was all Misha needed to find an alternate route out of the village and disappear before Jensen could catch up to him.

“If he hurts her, I swear I’ll kill him,” Jensen said in a low, dangerous voice, but with a threat of tears behind it.

“Dean... she’s a resourceful lady. I’m sure she can defend herself, especially against Misha.”

“Just him, sure. Him and Sebastian?”

Jared looked over at his old friend in concern. “Jay, what’s going on with you?”

Jensen shook his head. “Nothing. Forget it. Just help me keep an eye out for the Hannibal.”

They didn’t talk much after that for the next several days, until they finally caught up with Misha briefly at an overnight stop in Yakutsk. There, however, in the heat of the moment, a woman rushed out of the crowd and kissed Jensen hard. Misha and Miss Harris were just then being carried on the shoulders of other revelers into a meeting hall, and Miss Harris saw the kiss in progress. In retaliation—the fury on her face and the pointed looks she sent Jensen’s way suggested nothing else—she kissed Misha so hard, she knocked him over. Jensen saw that, snarled, and tried to go after them, but the oblivious crowd kept the two groups apart, to Jared’s relief. As it was, Jensen struggled for several minutes to reestablish a front of polite enthusiasm, but eventually the crush of bodies grew too overwhelming, and he had to politely but firmly demand that the Russians hand over his share of the gas so he and Jared could get out of town. They got about ten miles out before Jensen pulled over and stopped, his hands shaking on the steering wheel with barely controlled emotion.

“She was _jealous_ , Jay,” Jared said quietly. “I saw her. She saw you get kissed. That’s all it was.”

“I could have killed him,” Jensen confessed. “Could have torn him apart with my bare hands in front of God and everyone.” His eyes slipped closed, and he ran a trembling hand over his nose and mouth. “God forgive me, but I would have done it. I’ve never hated anyone so much in all my life.”

“She’s... I don’t... I don’t think she’s in love with him. But you know what she was like in Boracho, and that was before... everything.”

“If he so much as lays a hand on her again....”

“ _Jay_. Let it go. There’s nothing you can do about it tonight anyway. And when we catch them next time... maybe you’ll all feel more like talking instead of acting on impulse.”

Jensen drew a ragged breath and let it out again before looking over at Jared with heartsick eyes.

“I mean... you can’t be sure you’ve lost her until you’ve actually spoken to her, right?”

Jensen nodded jerkily. “If I ever even had her to begin with,” he added bitterly.

“We’ve got until Paris. I just feel sure you’ll find out. Just... not tonight.”

“Yeah. You’re right. Maybe tomorrow.”

But ‘tomorrow’ would be a long time in coming, prolonged for more reasons than just Misha deciding to depart from the official race route and thereby losing contact with the Impala... reasons none of them could have guessed in a million years.

* * *

“Boss,” Chad said as he walked into the _Sentinel_ editor’s eerily quiet office, “this dispatch just came in from Danni Harris. ‘Have crossed Carpanian border. No contact with Jensen car in nearly three weeks, so there’s no way of telling who’s in the lead.’”

Sam set down the copy of the paper she was rereading, with a front page article on the _Sentinel_ ’s change in hiring policy, and took the cigar out of her mouth. “The Chevrolet Motor Car Company built the Impala for The Great Jensen. Have they integrated yet?”

“No. They still refuse to hire any women.”

She stood. “Until Chevrolet changes its policy, there will be no mention of the Impala in this newspaper.”

He wasn’t easy to shock, but that declaration startled him badly. “But you can’t do that, Boss-lady. We’ll lose their advertising.”

She blew cigar smoke in his face. “ _Mister_ Lindberg, until my husband recovers his health, _I_ am in charge here.”

He sighed. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Now, let’s see.” She took the dispatch and went to the map. “They should be approaching the next gasoline stop, which is... Potsdorf.”

* * *

Misha, Sebastian, and Danneel were in fact getting close to Potsdorf, close enough that Misha called a halt beside a scenic lake overlooked by a castle so the men could wash the car and Danneel could wash herself. Danneel went a short way down the shore to strip down to her flimsies and frillies and take a brief swim, and Sebastian was so distracted watching her in the water that when he tried to dump a bucket of water on the car, he missed and hit Misha instead. Meekly getting to work on scrubbing the other side of the car didn’t spare him from getting splashed in return, and that prompted him to start arguing with Misha about whether or not they should leave Danneel here.

“I say we should have dumped her a long time ago!” Sebastian finally shouted.

“And I say we’ll dump her when I _say_ we’ll dump her!” Misha shot back.

“She’s been playing you for a sucker!”

Misha emptied his bucket over Sebastian’s head. Sebastian splashed his bucket in Misha’s face.

Before Misha could try to make another point, however, an unfamiliar voice interrupted, “Good afternoon, gentlemen.”

Both Americans turned to see three men on horseback looking at them. All three were in uniform; the two on the left and right wore red jackets and carried beribboned spears, but the third, who had golden brown hair and golden hazel eyes, had only a pistol on the belt around his gold-trimmed black jacket. His black fur cap was emblazoned with a giant golden two-headed eagle with a huge emerald at its center, which probably meant that he was someone terribly important... possibly even the owner of the castle on the far side of the lake, though Misha had no idea who he could be.

So Misha set down his bucket and asked as politely as he felt the situation warranted, “What do you want?”

“Who are you?” asked the man in the black jacket, who had apparently spoken before.

Misha doffed his hat. “Professor Collins, and who might you be?”

The two men in red jackets looked at Misha more closely. “Incredible!” one exclaimed quietly.

“Amazing!” the other agreed.

Then the conversation was interrupted again by the sound of another horse approaching, quickly accompanied by Danneel’s voice insisting on being released. A moment later, a third red-coated guard rode up, holding a half-dressed, very wet, very furious Danneel.

“I found this wildcat swimming in the lake,” he announced, amused by the way Danneel was struggling.

Danneel only flailed all the more and screeched, “I _demand_ to know what this is all about!”

“Very simple,” said the man in the black jacket, who seemed to be in charge. “You and your friends are under arrest.”

And with that, they and the car were unceremoniously hauled off to the castle that had previously made the lake so picturesque but now seemed forbiddingly remote.

* * *

Meanwhile, in Potsdorf itself, the Impala was winding slowly through a wildly cheering crowd toward the cathedral square in the center of the old city. The cathedral bells were ringing merrily; caps and flags were waving; confetti was flying; and Jared kept one arm out the window, both to wave to the crowd and to clear streamers off the windshield so that Jensen could still see to drive. Jensen was also waving as best he could while still keeping one hand on the wheel and one eye on the speedometer; the crowd was packed around the powerful car so tightly that the slightest loss of control could cause scores of injuries, and they didn’t want to risk that.

And then, just about the time Jensen parked and got out, a tall, thin man on horseback rode up to them and saluted. Were his greying handlebar mustache and piercing blue eyes not sufficiently indicative that he was a man of stature and authority, his black uniform coat was festooned with more medals and ribbons and braid than Jensen had seen on anyone this side of the Kaiser.

“I am Gen. Omundson,” the man stated grandiosely. “I am to escort you to the palace, where you’ll be the guests of His Royal Highness, Prince Krushnic.”

“We’re deeply honored, sir,” Jensen replied diplomatically and saluted.

Gen. Omundson returned the salute and turned his horse around.

“Who’s Prince Krushnic?” Jared asked as Jensen started to follow the general through the throng.

“He’s the crown prince of Carpania,” Jensen explained. “Don’t know much more about him than that.”

Once the confetti-strewn Impala had safely arrived in the courtyard of Schloss Potsdorf, which was more chateau than castle, Gen. Omundson escorted Jared and Jensen to their room and informed them of a ball to be given in honor of both their arrival and Prince Krushnic’s upcoming coronation. The old king had been in ill health for some time, long enough for the coronation plans to have already been made, and had died shortly after the racers had left Yakutsk. Unlike most constitutional monarchies like Great Britain, where accession was immediately official upon confirmation by Parliament regardless of when the coronation occurred, the tiny kingdom of Carpania still held to the old model by which accession could not be considered official until the coronation. Thus, Krushnic would not be king until his crowning the next day, an event the entire kingdom was eagerly awaiting. Jensen’s arrival only added to the excitement.

Even as road-weary as he was, Jensen was too gracious not to accept the prince’s invitation to the ball, and Jared knew better than to fail to follow Jensen’s lead. So amid reminiscences of the days when the pair of them trod the boards in flannel and denim every night and Jensen’s confession that he really was getting tired of wearing white all the time, they changed into their tuxes and made their way down to the ballroom for a round of polite small talk with a group of Potsdorf’s Bright Young Things.

They were spared at last by a fanfare and a herald announcing, “His Royal Highness Crown Prince Frederick Krushnic!”

Then there was another fanfare as a dark-haired man in a blue-and-white, velvet-and-satin uniform made his stumbling way down a long red-carpeted hall toward the ballroom, carrying a heavily jeweled goblet in his left hand that disappeared behind the edge of his fur-trimmed capelet with every other step. As the prince drew close enough for his features to be recognizable, however, the Americans’ eyes widened. The mustache was thinner, the expression inebriated and less shrewd, and there was a large mole on his left cheek, but the curls, the nose, the cobalt blue eyes....

“Jay,” Jared whispered.

“Shh,” Jensen returned.

“B-but that’s—that’s....”

“Shh! No, it isn’t!”

And Jensen was proven right when Prince Krushnic reached the end of his entryway, stopped, and complained in a much higher voice than Misha’s, “That was exhausting!” Then he laughed, a high, foppish laugh that he cut off by draining his goblet, which he then handed off to a guard before turning around carelessly to bow to various dignitaries. Not watching where he was going, he stumbled into the orchestra, got tangled up in several music stands, and ran into the piano before Gen. Omundson could get to him to steer him over to Jared and Jensen.

“Your Highness,” said Gen. Omundson, “may I present The Great Jensen.”

“Your Highness,” said Jensen with a bow, which the prince returned.

“And this is Mr. Padalecki.”

Jared bowed in turn.

Prince Krushnic bowed back. “Welcome to Potsdorf.”

Jared cleared his throat. “Excuse me, Your Highness, but do you have any relatives in the United States?”

The prince looked confused. “Me? Relatives in States?”

“It’s of no consequence, sire,” Jensen chimed in. “It’s just that you bear an uncanny resemblance to someone we both know.”

“Someone who looks like me?”

“Yes, sire.”

Prince Krushnic burst out laughing, and so did everyone else until he cut them off with a gesture. “Poor fellow,” he quipped then.

Everyone laughed again until he repeated the gesture... which Jared missed until Jensen elbowed him. Fortunately, Prince Krushnic thought that was funny, too, and started off a third round of laughter until he selected a partner to dance with and gave the orchestra the signal to begin the first waltz. Jensen asked one of the lovely young ladies nearest him for a dance, but by the time Jared got up his courage to brave the dance floor, all the other young ladies had been claimed by other young officers and courtiers, and he was stuck doing his best not to step on the feet of a matronly _grand dame_ who could have been his grandmother.

After several dances, however, Prince Krushnic called Jared, Jensen, and Gen. Omundson away from the ball for a private audience. “In the kingdom of Carpania,” he explained as they left the ballroom for a smaller parlor, “if one doesn’t waltz, one just doesn’t dance, and I love to dance.” He laughed. “Only trouble is, I hate the waltz!” He laughed again, and so did they. “So you know what I do? I waltz just enough to comply with tradition, and then I sneak off to more rewarding activities.”

He called for brandy as they walked through the doors to the parlor, which had a red velvet chaise into which he flopped carelessly and several green velvet armchairs, one of which Jensen took at the prince’s urging. After some banter about live entertainment, Prince Krushnic invited Jensen to stay for the coronation the next day, and Jensen accepted over Gen. Omundson’s probing objections over the delay in the race.

Just then the doors opened again, and another voice called, “Good evening, Your Highness!”

Prince Krushnic looked over and lit up. “Oh, Dickie, you rogue! Where have you been?”

“My apologies for being late, Your Highness,” ‘Dickie’ replied as he came around to stand next to the chaise, “but I was delayed by some last-minute business.”

“Oh, you haven’t been dueling again, you naughty boy, you?”

‘Dickie’ smiled indulgently and shook his head. “No, Your Highness.”

Prince Krushnic laughed and winked for a moment before turning back to Jensen. “Oh, Mr. Jensen, this is Baron Richard von Speight. Now, Baron von Speight, I must tell you, is Carpania’s greatest swordsman—in fact, his prowess with the blade is surpassed only by his reputation with the ladies.”

Jensen and the baron exchanged smiles and greetings, and there was more small talk and brandy for a moment.

Then as the baron pulled the general aside for a private conversation, the prince asked a question that Jensen didn’t get often but was always prepared for nonetheless: “What makes you so great, Mr. Jensen?”

“Greatness,” Jensen replied, “is a lighthearted title for theatrical amusements or a definition endowed on men too long dead to know that it’s been awarded. I’m simply Jensen, and I’m at your service, Your Highness.”

Prince Krushnic clearly didn’t know how to respond to that. He fumbled for a moment before coming up with a half-hearted attempt at a laugh, but he kept trying to process the idea past the brandy fog. And his silence gave Jensen a chance to glance over at where Baron von Speight and Gen. Omundson were conversing.

No, not conversing, _conspiring_. Jensen suddenly felt uneasy, and after helping the general see the drunken prince off to bed shortly before midnight, he whispered to Jared to keep his eyes open.


	7. Chapter 6: The Prince and the Performers

Jared didn’t really need Jensen’s warning, though he was glad to have his own suspicions confirmed. So after giving the Impala its nightly checkup and arranging for the palace guard to keep an eye on it, he casually mentioned that it was a beautiful night (which it was) and that he was therefore going to take a stroll around the grounds. The guards didn’t voice any objections, so they were most likely trustworthy, at least for the moment. Somewhat reassured, Jared took off at a leisurely pace and looked with appropriate levels of interest at everything, including the stars, as he moseyed around the front of the massive palace.

Barely had he rounded the corner to the side of the palace closest to the woods, however, when a hidden door in what had looked like the foundation swung open. He paused, and a second or two later, he heard Prince Krushnic laughing, more weakly than he had when Jensen and Gen. Omundson had carted his royal falling-down-drunk hide off to bed. That wouldn’t square with the prince being down here on his own and the drunkenness having been an act... but it would square with his being genuinely smashed and in the hands of Omundson and von Speight.

Suddenly Jared wasn’t Jared Padalecki anymore. He was Sam Winchester, on the hunt, instincts absorbed from a decade of playing the character asserting themselves with a vengeance. He quickly slipped into the woods and hid behind a tree that still afforded him a good view of the secret exit, the brush around him stilling just as von Speight and Omundson emerged, half carrying Prince Krushnic between them toward what looked like von Speight’s carriage. Von Speight was trying unsuccessfully to get the prince to keep his voice down, but Prince Krushnic was a giggling, stumbling mess and too excited by the prospect of keeping secrets and being king to be at all discreet. He clearly had no idea that he was being kidnapped.

There was only one thing for it. Jared waited until the carriage drove past his hiding place, then jumped on the back and held on through the long ride to von Speight’s lakeside castle. Once the carriage was past the guards at the portcullis and on its way across the courtyard to the front door, Jared jumped off and found a place to hide himself behind a patch of ivy. Only then did he register that the Hannibal was parked on the other side of the courtyard. And von Speight’s plan became crystal clear in a sudden snap.

In vain, Jared wished for some way to get word to Jensen. All he could do was to wait until von Speight and Omundson hauled the prince into the keep and find another door that wasn’t as well guarded. Jared and Jensen might not care much for Misha and Sebastian now, despite their former friendship, but Miss Harris and Prince Krushnic needed Jared’s help, and even Misha didn’t deserve to get mixed up in von Speight’s bid for power.

* * *

Meanwhile, in the tower, Misha watched disgustedly as Sebastian dutifully chipped away at the base of one of the bars in the window of their cell while Danneel, finally dried off and still fuming silently about having had to dress in front of the baron’s leering guards, kept an ear at the door. Finally, he went over to Danneel, whose plan Sebastian was trying to implement. “Of course, you realize it’ll do no good to get the bars out of the window.”

Danneel shushed him.

“You and your stupid ideas. Bas can’t accomplish anything with a pen knife, and even if he could, it’s at least a one-hundred-foot drop!”

Danneel shushed him again. “Someone’s coming!”

Sebastian hid his knife and ran to sit down on a stool near the door, while Danneel went to the bed to pick up the embroidery project she was faking and Misha went to lounge in front of the window to hide Sebastian’s work. They had just gotten settled when a group of guards came in; two of them picked Misha up and forcibly removed him from the room, ignoring both his protests and Danneel’s demand to see the American consul.

Sebastian sighed. “Now what?”

Danneel looked at the window with a grimace. “I guess keep working. One of us has to get out of here and get help.”

He nodded and went back to work while she went back to listening for noises in the hallway. After several minutes, he gave the bar a few experimental tugs—and fell over backward as the bar came out in his hands.

He turned to her in surprise. “It’s out!”

But she didn’t turn to look, only shushed him and motioned for him to come to the door. There was a sound in the distance like someone being punched and knocked out. Then it happened again, accompanied by the rattle of keys. They exchanged a look and hid behind the door just as it opened slowly and a brown-haired head poked past it cautiously. Sebastian brought the iron bar down on the back of said head, knocking out its owner, who collapsed into the cell.

It was Jared.

Horrified, Danneel ran to Jared and pulled him clear of the doorway. She checked his head, finding a nasty goose egg but no blood, and then began patting his face gently and shaking his shoulders a little to try to bring him around. “We’re so sorry,” she said quietly. “We didn’t know it was you. Jared. _Jared_.”

Jared snorted a little and groaned, but he didn’t come around.

Irritated, she turned back to Sebastian. “Well, don’t just stand there! Do something!” Then she turned her attention back to Jared. “Jared, _please_ wake up. Jared....”

Then a shadow fell over Jared’s back, and she looked up to see Sebastian, coat over his arm and hat and iron bar in hand, step out into the hall and close the door behind him with a flourish.

“Bas!” she cried as she jumped to her feet, then tried the door, which was still locked from her side. “BAS! Come open this door!”

But Sebastian was already on his way down the hall.

“Bas, you _rat_! I’ll get you for this!”

Before she could get any more worked up over Sebastian’s betrayal, however, Jared groaned and finally stirred.

She ran back to him. “Jared! Jared, are you all right?”

He groaned again and said a word he’d never said in her presence before. “Jay? Wh’happ’ned?”

“Jensen’s not here. It’s me, Danneel. I’m so sorry, Jared....”

He turned his head enough to frown blearily at her. “Miz Harris? What....”

“Sebastian hit you. We thought you were one of the baron’s men.”

“Von Speight!” He tried to sit up too quickly and collapsed against the bed with a groan, one hand flying to his head. After he’d sat there for a moment, he looked at her again. “Where’s Misha?”

“The baron’s men carried him out of here maybe fifteen minutes ago. They didn’t say why.”

He started to say something but stopped himself, then blew out a frustrated breath. “The crown prince is a dead ringer for Misha. Von Speight’s planning to have Misha crowned in Krushnic’s place, then... I dunno, I guess have Misha abdicate in favor of him or Gen. Omundson.” He shifted, massaging his aching head. “I dunno what Sebastian’s up to, but we need to get out of here, rescue the prince.”

“Sebastian got one of the bars out of the window. I can squeeze through—”

“That’s no good. We’re up too high.”

“But we can tear up the sheets and use those, plus my dress, to make a rope for me to climb down!”

“No.”

“I’m lighter than you! And I have experience; I’ve climbed Pikes Peak.”

“Jensen and I have done that and El Capitan, twice. But that’s not the problem.”

“If you’re trying to keep me out of danger because of some chauvinistic male sense of—”

He took her gently by the shoulders. “Miss Harris, listen to me. I’m Jensen’s safety coordinator. I have to study these things to make sure he won’t get hurt doing one of his stunts. And I’m telling you straight, a rope made of muslin and lawn will not support a human’s weight over a climb of that distance.”

Her mouth fell open in indignation. “Are you trying to say that I’m—”

“Miss Harris. _Dee_. Not even an eight-year-old could make that climb safely. This has nothing to do with you. We’d need a much heavier, sturdier rope to be able to get down from here, and probably a sturdier anchor than the window bars. If you try it your way, the fabric will tear before you can reach the ground, and if you fall, you’d be badly hurt, even killed.”

“But... then... w-well, what should we do, then?”

He sighed and looked around, rubbing her shoulders lightly as he thought. “Let me borrow a hairpin,” he finally said, looking at her again. “If I can’t pick the lock, I should be able to remove the screws so we can get inside the door and draw the bolt manually.”

She studied his face for some sign of contempt, of paternalism, of... of anything she could hate. All she found was open, honest concern.

“Please,” he said quietly, looking for all the world like a giant worried hound.

She sighed, pulled out one of her hairpins, and handed it to him.

He took it with a gentle smile. “Thank you. I’ll get you out of here in one piece, I promise.”

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

“I’ll be fine. Just have to be careful how I hold my head,” he added, his smile turning wry.

And with that, he used the bed for leverage to push himself to his feet and stumbled over to the door, leaving Danneel to kick herself for letting him thwart her plan. She was an emancipated woman, doggonit; she didn’t need a man to rescue her!

Then her eyes fell on her embroidery scissors, and she realized that she could still prove Jared wrong. _Cutting_ the sheets wouldn’t make noise and attract his attention like tearing them would, and it also wouldn’t weaken the threads as much. Closer examination of the sheets revealed them to be the old-fashioned kind made of two lengths of narrow muslin stitched together to be wide enough to cover the bed, so she could start by taking apart those seams and then see how many strips she needed to cut to reach the ground. So decided, she nodded once and determinedly picked up her scissors.

She was about a third of the way down the seam of the flat sheet when she heard an urgent whisper of “Dee. _Dee._ ” Startled, she turned to see Jared easing the lock plate onto the stool near the door.

“What?!” she gasped.

He motioned her over and handed back the hairpin. “Your fingers are smaller than mine. Can you reach in there and get the bolt open?”

“Um. I’ll try. But I don’t know if I’ll be able to see.”

“Here.” He quickly retrieved the lantern from the hook near the door and held it where the light fell on the lock mechanism.

“Thank you.” She studied the mechanism for a moment, then reached into the door with two fingers, not feeling at all confident in what she was doing, and felt her way around until something gave a bit. Taking a deep breath, she kept prodding carefully until the latch assembly finally came loose in her hand. With a quiet “Oh!” she pulled it out and tried the handle, and the door creaked open a short way.

He met her astonished look with a proud smile and put the lantern back. Then he slipped off his shoes and motioned for her to do the same. That done, he opened the door further and ushered her out with a barely audible “C’mon.” Once they were in the hall, he carefully closed the door again, then motioned for her to follow and keep quiet. Barely had they reached the top of the stairs, however, when he swayed and caught himself against the wall.

“Jared!” she breathed, noting how badly he’d paled.

He braced himself against the wall and gulped down a couple of breaths. “Where’d they go?” he asked her. “Where’d they take him?”

“I don’t know. Down, I think. Are... will you....”

“Yeah. I’ll... give me a bit. Have to take our time anyway.” He swallowed a couple of times. “Have you heard... anyone up here?”

“You mean other p—”

He held a finger to his lips. “Yeah.”

“No.”

“Okay. If... if he went down... right. Don’t remember... no, no other... in the tower. Down, then, okay.”

She looked at him oddly. “Why are you—”

He held a finger to his lips again and mouthed, _The s sound carries._

 _Oh_ , she mouthed back and grimaced.

He gave her shoulder a comforting squeeze and shut his eyes for a moment longer, until the color started creeping back into his cheeks. Then he took another deep breath, blew it out again, and opened his eyes. “Okay. Down.”

As they began inching down the winding staircase, Danneel found herself praying that Jared wouldn’t lose his balance and fall. Quite apart from the noise it would make, she suddenly couldn’t bear the thought of his being injured any worse than he already was, never mind the prospect of her having to carry or drag him to safety all on her own if he lost consciousness again.

And before she could catch herself, she added, _Jensen, if you’re coming, please_ hurry _!_

* * *

As it happened, however, Jensen was at that moment locked in a cell of his own back at Schloss Potsdorf. He had just begun worrying over how long Jared had been gone when five armed guards had turned up at his door to arrest him for espionage. Baffled and unarmed, Jensen had not tried to fight his way out, especially since he didn’t know Jared’s whereabouts. Now he was pacing, trying to work out whether the out-of-place monk at the end of the torchlight procession he’d passed on the way into the dungeon had been big enough to be Jared in disguise and, if not, how in the world he was going to get out of this one.

 _What would Dean Winchester do?_ he thought wryly, looking at the door.

And suddenly he heard a harsh whisper of “Jensen? Jensen?”

“In here!” he called back and went to the door.

There was a rattle of keys, and the door swung open to reveal the monk, who was....

“Sebastian?!”

Sebastian held up his hands. “Jensen, I promise you, I will explain everything, but we’ve got to get out of here and save Misha.”

“Where are Miss Harris and Jared?”

“They’re with the baron.”

Jensen’s heart suddenly started racing. “The baron?”

“The baron, the baron, he’s got everyone. Come _on_ , we’ve got to save Misha.”

For lack of a better option, Jensen followed Sebastian past knocked-out guards and out of the dungeon. There were two more guards standing near the Impala’s hood, but they weren’t facing the corner of the front steps where Jensen and Sebastian paused to assess the situation. One mad dash across the courtyard and a quick blow to knock the guards’ heads together, and the former co-stars were sliding into the Impala’s front seat and roaring away from the palace.

“Where are we headed?” Jensen asked as they sped toward the gates.

“Er, l-left,” Sebastian replied, fumbling for a map.

Jensen waited until he’d made the turn to reach up and switch on the dome light. “Glove box.”

“Right, thanks.” Sebastian retrieved the map. “Now we’re... here, and the baron’s castle is on a lake... only lake on this map is straight ahead.”

Jensen nodded once, turned the dome light off and the headlights on, and floored the accelerator, pushing the Impala to her unheard-of top speed of 120 miles an hour. “So what’s all this about von Speight?”

“He caught us this afternoon and arrested us, didn’t even give a reason. We’d been working on an escape plan when they took Misha away. Then Jared showed up a few minutes later, only I didn’t recognize that ridiculous hair of his, and I knocked him out.”

“You what?!”

“I thought he was one of the baron’s men, honest. Well, then the door was open, and there was no telling when anyone would be back or when Jared would wake up, and someone had to get help....”

“Oh, spare me the snow job. So you left Jared and Miss Harris in the cell and escaped yourself.”

“To get help, I swear! I had planned to escape in the car, but there was a carriage right by the door, so I climbed in and hid under the seat—and it was a jolly good thing I did, because a moment later Misha came out with the baron and some general, and he was wearing some monkey suit that looks even more ridiculous than his Castiel costume. And the baron told Misha he’d be king tomorrow—”

“He who?”

“Misha. And after he’s crowned, Misha’s supposed to declare the general chancellor and abdicate. They _threatened Misha’s life_ if he didn’t go through with it!”

“Yeah, but I bet he wasn’t too upset about the possibilities, especially getting me thrown in jail on trumped-up charges long enough for you two to get to Paris.”

“Jensen, you _know_ he’s not a good mimic. You should have heard the general trying to direct him on the way back to the palace. It was disastrous. He’ll never make it through the entire coronation without giving himself away!”

“Look, right now, I couldn’t care less about Misha’s problems, but von Speight’s got Miss Harris, Prince Krushnic, _and_ Jared still locked up, and I do care about them. And we’ll be there in a couple of minutes, so tell me the layout.”

Sebastian sighed. “Well, the castle’s surrounded on three sides by water. There’s one gate we can enter from the road, a courtyard, and then the keep is built out from the back outer walls. Big central tower, some windows look out on the courtyard, some on the lake. And our car’s parked near the front door.”

Jensen nodded thoughtfully and formulated a plan, which he explained to Sebastian as the Impala came within sight of the lake. Then he switched off the headlights and eased off the speed until he could safely turn off the engine and coast to a stop by the far side of the lake. Once the car was parked, he retrieved a strong rope and grappling hook from the trunk, stripped off his shirt and footwear, and looped the coil of rope securely over his neck and shoulder.

“You’re sure this will work?” Sebastian fretted.

Jensen gave him a patented Dean Winchester Look™. “You got any better ideas?”

“No.”

“Then shut up and do as I told you.”

Sebastian sighed and climbed into the driver’s seat while Jensen eased himself into the lake and swam as silently as possible toward the nearest wall. Once he reached land, he found a low point in the wall, one that would most likely lead to the courtyard, and threw the grappling hook through one of the crenellations. Climbing the wall was relatively easy, as was jumping from the top of the wall to the staircase that ran along it and from the staircase over the banister to the ground. The only guard he could see was at the gate, where the portcullis was lowered. He quickly made his way over to the gate, knocked out the guard and another who started to come out of the gatehouse guardroom, and began raising the portcullis.

Before the guards outside the gate could figure out what was going on, Sebastian roared through the gate in the Impala, parked by the tower door, and jumped out to run to the Hannibal. The outside guards ran in and took aim at Sebastian, but Jensen knocked them out before they could fire. Surprised by the commotion, von Speight opened the tower door and looked out, and Sebastian promptly aimed the Hannibal’s cannon squarely at his chest. Von Speight slammed the door shut, but Sebastian fired anyway, demolishing the doors. Then, as more guards came running, Sebastian raised the Hannibal’s chassis to its full height, activated the smoke screen, and started driving in circles around the perimeter of the courtyard until the smoke was thick enough that the guards were running into each other. One of the guards had the presence of mind to lower the portcullis, but the cannon made short work of it when Sebastian was ready to make his exit, and off he drove with the guards in hot pursuit. In the confusion, Jensen had little trouble finding a side door into the keep and few guards to knock out to make his way through it.

Von Speight had gone back to the front door to try to see what was going on, but the smoke was too thick. He gave up and came back into the front hall... only to be confronted by Jensen with a fencing foil.

“Good evening, Baron,” Jensen said politely.

Von Speight’s eyebrows went up. “Well! Mr. Jensen! What a pleasant surprise! I half expected to see you again, but not with a sword in your hand. You prefer the foil?”

Jensen shrugged. “Not particularly. It happened to be convenient.”

“I presume you know how to use one.”

“I hope that won’t be necessary.”

Von Speight smirked. “I’m sure you do.”

“Will you release Miss Harris and the others?”

“No.” Von Speight started toward a rack of swords that hung on the wall nearest to him.

“I’m afraid this will be necessary.”

“You’re being very foolish.”

“That’s an assumption, Baron. You make me the victim even before we start.”

Von Speight took a foil with a shrug. “It’s your life.”

Jensen smiled dangerously. “You’re assuming again. En garde.”

They fenced for a couple of minutes and found themselves equally matched in skill, even though Jensen was a head taller than von Speight. Neither landed a hit. Then von Speight called for a switch to sabers, but though he got in a glancing blow on Jensen’s arm, Jensen managed to strike von Speight’s cheek and to slice open his fancy silk shirt. On the point of defeat, von Speight parried and turned to dash toward one of the windows that overlooked the lake.

“Running away, Baron?” Jensen taunted.

Von Speight paused at the window. “As a very wise English gentleman once said, ‘He who fights and runs away may live to fight another day.’ So, until another day, Mr. Jensen!” He threw his sword at Jensen, who easily knocked it away with his own. “Please excuse me,” von Speight continued. “I have a boat waiting.” With a flourish he opened the window and dove into the boat... and Jensen heard him crash straight through the hull and into the lake.

Before Jensen could figure out what to do next, he heard a cry of “Jay!” from the staircase behind him, and then he had his arms full of Danneel as Jared stumbled over.

“Brother, what happened to you?!” Jensen asked, his arms returning Danneel’s embrace almost as if they had a mind of their own, taking and giving comfort in equal measure.

Jared put a hand to his head. “Sebastian gave me a headache. I’ll be all right. How’s your arm?”

Danneel pulled back with a gasp. “Oh! You’re bleeding!”

“It’s really not that deep,” Jensen started to protest.

“Oh, nonsense,” she replied, hitched up her skirt, and ripped the ruffle off the hem while he was still registering that she was in her stocking feet. She then tied the wispy fabric around the saber cut before he could object. “Have you got any arrowroot in the car?”

“It’ll clot on its own just fine, Miss Harris. We need to find Prince Krushnic and get to the cathedral before the coronation.”

Jared shook his head a little and swayed. “He’s not in the tower, but we haven’t had time to see if von Speight has cells in another part of the castle.”

“All right. _I’ll_ look. _You_ stay here and rest. Miss Harris?”

Jared frowned. “I’m fine.”

Jensen drew himself up to his full height, which didn’t always work on the Sasquatch, and went into Dean mode. “You are _not_ fine, Sammy. You’ve got a concussion, and you’re staying right here. C’mon, sit down ’fore you fall down.” He grabbed Jared’s arm and marched him over to a chair by the fireplace.

“Deeeeeean....”

“ _Sam_.”

Jared huffed.

Jensen shoved him into the chair. “Sit. Stay.”

Jared rolled his eyes and barked once.

Jensen started toward a door that looked like it might lead downstairs. “Miss Harris, make sure he doesn’t do anything stupid before I get back. _Sit_ on him if you have to.”

She nodded. “All right, but—wait—why did you....”

Jensen paused and turned back to her, his expression softening. “He may not be blood, but he’s still my brother.”

He could see her thinking, reassessing, fitting puzzle pieces into place, in the brief pause before she nodded again with a quiet “Oh.”

“So... keep an eye on him for me?”

“Of course.”

He smiled. “Thanks.”

His luck held. The door he tried led almost immediately to a stairwell, at the bottom of which someone was snoring. Jensen eased down the steps until he could see bars, then made just enough noise to attract the lone sentry, whom he slammed into the wall before taking the dungeon keys. The snoring sound led him deeper into the dungeon, to a cell off the large central room, where a thin, dark-haired figure lay curled on his side on a rope bed, clad only in his long underwear. The wall, mattress, and wooden bed frame were damp, as was the man’s hair, as if he’d had water thrown onto his face to wake him up within the last hour but had gone right back to sleep after moving his head to the dry end of the bed. And the cell reeked of brandy.

Jensen sighed, opened the cell door, and went to the bed. “Your Highness?” he called as he shook the man’s shoulder.

The only response he got was “Nnnn... Mumsie, ’s Saturday...” mumbled on breath that would stun a horse.

 _Diplomacy be damned_ , Jensen thought, moved out of flailing range, and bent over Prince Krushnic’s exposed ear. “HEY!”

The prince startled awake and spluttered for a moment before his eyes finally mostly focused. “Oh! Why, what are you doing here, you good Jensen, you?”

“I’ve come to take you to the cathedral, Your Highness.”

“Oh, rah! Where’s Dickie?”

“Indisposed,” Jensen replied, trying not to worry about what state von Speight would be in when the guards fished him out of the lake.

“What about Gen. Omundson?”

“Taking care of some business elsewhere. C’mon, Your Highness, we need to go now.”

“We’re doin’ something secret,” Prince Krushnic slurred as Jensen hauled him to his feet. “’N I’m going to be king.” Then he swayed dangerously. “I’m ’fraid... I’ve had a teeny weeny li’l bit too much to drink.”

Jensen sighed. “Sorry to have to do this, sire, but we don’t have much time.” And with that, he pulled the royal sot across his shoulders and carried him out of the dungeon at a run.

“Go see if you can find some coffee, would you, Dee?” Jared was saying as Jensen reached the top of the stairs with his burden.

“I’ll do no such thing,” Danneel shot back. “Jensen told you to stay put, and I’m here to make sure you do!”

“Forget it,” Jensen interrupted as he burst out into the hall, not breaking stride. “We can get coffee in Potsdorf. Let’s _go!_ ”

He didn’t have to tell them twice. Though he kept his eyes on the exit route, he heard them fall in behind him. Out in the courtyard, Sebastian had returned to do more doughnuts and keep the guards confused, but the smoke screen hadn’t yet built up to the point that Jensen couldn’t see the Impala or the gate. A few quick strides got him over to the car; then he threw Prince Krushnic into the back seat, jumped into the driver’s seat, and waited just long enough for Jared to get in with the prince while Danneel slid into shotgun. Then he switched on the ignition, and the Impala leapt toward the gate with a ferocious growl as if she had a mind of her own. Sebastian tried to follow, but the Hannibal’s six-cylinder 70-horsepower engine was no match for the Impala’s top-secret V8, and Jensen and his passengers were out of cannon range even before Sebastian could get out the gate to try to fire on them.


	8. Chapter 7: The End of the Road

As early as the sun rose in this part of Europe at this time of year, the sky was already lightening when the Impala approached the outskirts of Potsdorf half an hour later. Jensen had no way of knowing what time Misha would be brought to the cathedral, since Prince Krushnic had quickly tired of whooping over the Impala’s impossible rate of speed and had passed out with his head on Jared’s shoulder, but two things were obvious: they needed to get to the cathedral ASAP, and both Jared and Prince Krushnic were in serious need of coffee. “We didn’t come into town from this direction,” he confessed quietly to Danneel as he began slowing the car to a speed more reasonable for driving through the narrow city streets. “I’d rather not have to go clear to the Domplatz to find a café, but I don’t know what else might be on the way.”

She nodded once. “I’ll keep my eyes open— _Jay!_ That farmhouse!”

He looked where she was pointing, and sure enough, there was a farmhouse not far ahead with its lights on. Praying the farmer was friendly, he turned in at the drive and pulled to a stop behind the house, out of sight of the road. The combined ruckus of the car’s engine noise and scattering, squawking chickens was enough to bring the farmer and his wife to the back door just as Jensen and Danneel jumped out of the car.

“ _Vam govoryat po-russkyi?_ ”[1] Danneel asked before Jensen could say anything.

The wide-eyed farmer and his wife shook their heads.

“ _Sprechen Sie Deutsch?_ ”[2] Jensen tried.

“ _Ja, ’n bissel_ ,”[3] the farmer answered slowly.

Jensen was just about to try to explain what was happening when Jared hauled Prince Krushnic out of the back seat and said wearily, “ _Café negro, por favor_.”[4]

The astonished couple bowed and scraped and ushered the travelers into the kitchen, where the farmer brought aspirin and his wife plied Jared and the prince with black coffee as well as eggs and bacon, despite Jensen’s attempt to explain that they had half an hour, at the outside, to get to the cathedral if Sebastian came straight to Potsdorf.

With a sigh, Jensen turned back to Danneel, who was looking at his bandaged arm. “Are you sure you don’t need some arrowroot for that cut?” she asked, looking up at him. “Goldenseal, anything?”

He shook his head. “It was a clean cut. I’m fine. How are you?”

“I’m all right. Little shaken, I suppose.”

“No, I mean... did anyone hurt you?”

“W-ell, the guards got a bit fresh, but....”

“And Misha? Sebastian?”

Her eyes flashed. “They wouldn’t have dared.”

He nodded slowly. “Good.”

Then she smiled wryly. “Of course, I think Misha only wanted me with him to translate for him. Did you know his mother’s from Moscow but never taught him a word of Russian?” She looked both amused and skeptical, but he couldn’t tell what part of the story she didn’t believe.

He chuckled, knowing the whole thing was a lie; Misha’s mother was from an old Boston family, had gone on the grand tour as a girl, and had named her sons after two charming young Russians she’d met in Paris. Then he glanced down at his hands briefly before looking up at Danneel again. “Dee, seeing you again, I... I just....” But he got lost in those warm, sassy brown eyes of hers and floundered for something to say. All that came to mind were long-ago monologues— _Lisa, my heart, if it is not too late; that is to say, if your offer stands, I will come in and have some tea_....

She shook herself suddenly. “Um. I... I’ll go get you a shirt.” And before he could find his voice again, she went outside to the car.

“Why does the coffee have to be black?” he suddenly heard Prince Krushnic complain. “It’s so _bitter_. I’d rather have brandy.”

Something stirred in Jensen then that he hadn’t felt in a number of years, and it swept over him as he turned back to the table, transforming him instantly into the most terrible aspect of his most famous vaudeville character: Dean possessed of the Mark of Cain. The farmer’s wife froze on her way to the shelf that held a few bottles of wine, and Prince Krushnic felt Jensen’s eyes on him and looked up at him nervously.

Jensen snarled, “Drink. It. All.”

Prince Krushnic gulped and downed the rest of his coffee in record time, then meekly held out his cup for another serving. Jared gave Jensen a _Well played_ wink and poured the coffee.

Danneel cleared her throat from somewhere behind him. “Jay? Here’s your shirt.”

Jensen sighed and relaxed as the darkness left him, and he was able to smile when he turned back to her and accepted the shirt. “Thanks.”

Not until he got his shirt on did he realize that the farmer’s wife was still frozen in shock, but she understood just enough German to know the word _Schauspieler_ (actor), and that broke the tension in the room. Then Prince Krushnic insisted that Jared and Jensen tell him all about their acting career, so Jensen sat down and gave a bare-bones account while guzzling some coffee and eating a few strips of bacon while Danneel ate the fried egg that was on his plate. That wasn’t enough information to satisfy Prince Krushnic, of course, but the more his mind was cleared by the combination of caffeine and adrenaline, the more Jensen insisted on keeping his focus on von Speight’s plot.

By the time the prince finished his second cup of coffee, he was sober enough to have gotten his head around what was going on and the seriousness of the situation. Then he looked down at himself in dismay. “But I can’t go to the cathedral like this. I haven’t any clothes.”

“Is there any law about what you’re supposed to wear?” Jared asked.

“Well, no, but... well, you see, traditionally—”

Jensen stood. “Sire, you’re a new king for a new century. Hang tradition. You can borrow one of my suits.”

Prince Krushnic’s mouth fell open. “You’d do that? For me?”

“Of course.”

“Oh, you _good_ Jensen, you! I accept.” Prince Krushnic jumped up and followed Jensen out to the car.

“I expect it’ll be a little big on you,” Jensen cautioned as he opened the trunk. The prince was, after all, more or less the same height and build as Misha, shorter and scrawnier than Jensen, though with slightly more of a paunch thanks to his interest in booze over exercise. Still, Jensen was the closest match in terms of height and girth; Prince Krushnic would drown in anything of Jared’s.

But Prince Krushnic only shook his head. “That’s all right. Just as long as I don’t show up in my underwear. I mean, there’s a time and a place, but it wouldn’t do for one’s coronation, would it?” Jensen half expected that pronouncement to be followed by a high-pitched laugh, but all that came out was a wry chuckle.

“No, I should say not.” Jensen retrieved his tux and a clean shirt from one of his suitcases and handed them to the prince.

Prince Krushnic took the clothes reverently and looked at them for a moment, then looked up at Jensen again, his face somber. “I don’t remember much about last night, but... you carried me out of that prison, didn’t you?”

Jensen nodded. “I’m sorry for the indignity, Your Highness.”

Prince Krushnic put a hand on Jensen’s arm. “Oh, no. No, no, no—Jensen, you... you’re the first person since Mumsie to want something _good_ for me and make sure I got it, even if I didn’t want it. Nobody else will stand up to me. They just smile, and....” He sniffled. “I’ve a hundred cousins scattered all over Europe, and all of them hate me. If a war should break out, I’ve no idea whose side I’m on. I thought Dickie was my best friend, but now... now I know he doesn’t even like me.” He glanced down at the clothes again briefly. “You’re the first person who’s ever been really _nice_ to me. To mean it. Perhaps it’s because you’re an American. I wish you weren’t. I’d be giving you the highest honors I could bestow.”

Jensen both ducked his head and shook it. “That wouldn’t be necessary.”

“I know. That’s why I’d want to.” The prince patted his arm and started looking around for a place to get dressed.

It took another ten minutes for Prince Krushnic to get ready to go and for the travelers to take their leave of the farmer and his wife, who refused the money Jensen offered to pay for the meal. Jensen looked at the sky as he pulled the Impala back onto the road, noting that it was a considerably lighter grey than it had been when they arrived and that the eastern horizon was starting to turn pink.

“Hope we haven’t delayed too long,” he thought aloud.

Prince Krushnic waved a languid hand from the back seat. “Oh, no, I wasn’t supposed to leave the palace until sunrise anyway.”

“Due respect, Your Highness, but you don’t know Professor Collins. Even just knowing I’d escaped could have prompted him to order the timetable moved up. Call me paranoid, but I’m not going to relax until we can be sure we’ve stopped this whole crazy scheme once and for all.”

The prince shot Jensen a worried look and started giving him directions to the cathedral.

Neither the Hannibal nor the royal carriage was anywhere in sight when the Impala rumbled into the Domplatz a few minutes later. Just to be on the safe side, though, Jared and Jensen retrieved their revolvers from the trunk and slid them into their waistbands, hidden by their vests and jackets.

Then Jensen looked over at Danneel. “I know you can fence. Can you shoot?”

She huffed. “What kind of question is that?”

He pulled his small gun from his boot holster and handed it to her. “Don’t use it unless you have to.”

She swallowed hard, nodded once, and tucked the gun into her belt in such a way that it was hidden by a ruffle.

He nodded back, then turned to Prince Krushnic. “All right, Your Highness, it’s show time.”

The prince nodded and turned toward the cathedral doors with a look of grim determination. He clearly hadn’t had much practice in standing with his shoulders squared and his spine straight or in walking with a manful stride, but he gave it the old college try and looked a good deal more intimidating than his usual drunken demeanor. Jared and Jensen fell in two steps behind him, flanking him on either side, and Danneel brought up the rear. Judging from the almost immediate silence, the group made a strong impression on the handfuls of spectators who had turned out early to find good spots from which to enjoy the impending celebrations.

Unfortunately, the same could not be said of the archbishop. When Prince Krushnic tried to insist that the coronation begin at once, the archbishop puffed and spluttered and objected “We’ve never” and “We’ve always” and “Tradition” this and “Tradition” that. Neither Prince Krushnic nor Jensen could convince him that anything was amiss...

... until Misha turned up in a long ermine-trimmed purple velvet cape and ridiculous lavender satin outfit that had probably been designed two hundred years earlier, with Gen. Omundson and assorted other military greybeards surrounding him, and it was patently obvious to all and sundry that _something_ was very definitely amiss. Misha, predictably, froze.

“There!” Prince Krushnic cried, pointing at Misha before turning back to the archbishop. “Didn’t I tell you?”

Gen. Omundson recovered before anyone else in his party. “Aha! Our escaped American spy, trying to install an impostor! Seize them!”

Jensen pulled Danneel behind him as he and Jared closed ranks in front of Prince Krushnic. But the guards only looked from one supposed prince to the other in confusion.

Prince Krushnic stamped his foot. “I am _not_ an impostor! _He_ is! Look, he’s even stolen my clothes!”

“Me?!” Misha squeaked, which unfortunately made him sound exactly like the prince.

Before anyone could go for a gun, the archbishop hurried between the two groups. “Gentlemen, _please!_ Surely there is a way to settle all this peacefully!”

“I’ve a birthmark,” Prince Krushnic offered.

“Those can be faked,” Danneel noted.

Then Jared narrowed his eyes and rattled off a string of nonsensical syllables that Kripke had once insisted were the angelic equivalent of _Your mother works in a dime store_.

“Eh?” asked Prince Krushnic.

“What?” asked the archbishop.

“What?” asked Gen. Omundson.

“It’s funnier in Enochian,” Misha began automatically in his Castiel voice—and froze again as he realized he’d given himself away.

As if on cue, Sebastian poked his head around the edge of the door. “Hey, Professor, let’s go! I got the car!”

Misha didn’t have to be told twice. He unclasped the chain holding the heavy cape around his shoulders and started pushing past the men holding its train. Jared, Jensen, and Danneel immediately gave chase, but the Hannibal was already speeding out of the Domplatz by the time they passed the door; Sebastian must have left it running. Exchanging a look, Jensen and his passengers wasted no time in rushing to the Impala, and both Jared and Danneel got in on the same side, though Jared took the back seat.

As Jensen jumped into the driver’s seat, he heard Prince Krushnic call after him, “Goodbye! Farewell, you good Jensen, you! I hope you win, I hope you win!”

 _Same to you, idjit_ , Jensen thought with a wry affectionate pang, suddenly reminded of D. J. Qualls and his lovably bungling character, Garth. _Same to you._

Then he kept his eyes on the road until it became clear that Misha had pulled his disappearing trick again. Suppressing a curse, he steered the Impala out of Potsdorf as quickly as he safely could.

As they passed the city limits, Jensen finally said, “Hey, good catch with the Enochian, Jar—” But he broke off when a glance in the rearview mirror showed him Jared slumped against the door, eyes closed. “Jared?!”

Jared’s only response was a slight snore.

“Keep driving,” Danneel ordered as she turned around and reached over the back of the seat to check Jared’s pulse and breathing. She tried to check his pupils, but he pulled away when she touched his eyelid. “Jared. Jared, honey, wake up for a moment.”

“Nnnnnn,” said Jared and tilted the opposite direction until he was mostly lying down.

Jensen sighed. “Reckon we ought to leave him be. Guess the coffee wore off.”

Danneel nodded reluctantly. “Still ought to wake him every couple of hours, make sure he’s still all right.”

He smiled. “Welcome back.”

She smiled back, then frowned suddenly. “Now, what was the meaning of giving me a gun and then shoving me behind you like that?”

“It was a reflex. I didn’t want you to get shot.”

“As the only woman present?”

“As the most valuable person in the room,” he replied before thinking.

She had her mouth open to retort, but whatever she was about to say died in her throat as she blinked. “Oh.”

They didn’t say much to each other after that, but it was just as well. He found his mind whirling, trying to make sense of everything that had happened in the last day, especially where she was concerned. A lot had been stripped away between them—and not just because there had been fewer layers of clothing between them than ever before. He couldn’t stop thinking about that hug at von Speight’s castle, how warm and comfortable and natural it had felt to have her in his arms that way. And somehow they’d managed to skip past first names and straight into nicknames, ones given by Jared at that, which... well, was just fitting somehow. Danneel was smart and capable, beautiful and brave, yet still as foolhardy and brash as the day they had met.

And he couldn’t imagine spending his life with anyone else.

The problem, of course, was figuring out how to _say_ that to her. He wasn’t sure he could find the right words on his own, but there were no prepared speeches he knew that would fit. Even if there were, he couldn’t phrase his feelings in terms of home and family and traditionally romantic things; she’d spent too long on guard against sentimentality of that kind, and her back was still up about slights, real or perceived, she’d received at the hands of men lately. What could he possibly say that she’d believe?

He was still stewing over the situation when they stopped for the night beside a river somewhere in Germany. After supper, she took the opportunity to wash some of her clothes while he got cleaned up. He had just come back to camp and started shaving when Jared pulled Jensen’s guitar out of its hiding place in the trunk and tried to tune it. Unfortunately, Jared’s headache hadn’t subsided enough for him to be able to bear having those sound vibrations so close to his own ear, and he paused with a groan.

“It’s flat,” Danneel told him quietly, coming back from checking the clothesline.

Jared sighed and handed her the guitar. “Think I’d better turn in.” And before she or Jensen could say anything, he stood and trudged up the riverbank to the car.

Jensen turned back to his shaving mirror as Danneel wandered down to sit by the river and finished tuning the guitar. Then she began picking out a quiet tune and sang along with it:

_Come along with me to the Sweetheart Tree,  
Come and carve your name next to mine...._

He couldn’t stand it any longer. He finished shaving, wiped his face, and walked over to her. “Dee,” he said, “I believe the time has come for us to resolve our differences.”

She smiled. “Good.”

He sat down beside her. “As you know, I’ve steadfastly maintained an uncompromising position about women’s rights and the equality of sexes.”

“As have I.”

“Therefore, it is safe to assume that that has been the principle area of our conflict.”

“No doubt of it.”

“Therefore, in the interest of progress and harmony, I am willing to concede to your point of view.”

She blinked. “Concede?”

“You are an emancipated woman, Dee Harris. And I am an emancipated man.” He leaned over and kissed her tenderly.

And she slapped him and went back to the car in a huff, leaving him sitting baffled on the riverbank.

* * *

Not only were progress and harmony not achieved, Jensen and Danneel argued from breakfast the next morning all the way through the remaining 300 miles or so to Paris, each accusing the other of being unreasonable, inconsistent, arrogant, irresponsible, and more. Jared, relegated to the back seat, couldn’t get a word in edgewise and eventually gave up trying. So severe was the tension that when they got to Paris and Danneel tried to give Jensen directions, Jensen tightened his grip on the steering wheel, snarled, and ignored her.

“Go back and turn right!” she demanded at one point.

“We do not turn right!”

“I know Paris!”

“So do I!”

“Well, you have to turn right in order to get to the Eiffel Tower!”

“If we turned right back there, we’d end up on the Montmarte steps!”

(Little did they know that Misha and Sebastian had taken just such a wrong turn and were at that moment bouncing down the Montmarte steps in order to get turned around the right direction.)

By the time the Impala finally made the right turn and was passing the cheering crowd along the final path to the finish line, Jensen had accused Danneel of being “as emancipated as a confirmed spinster in a knitting bee” for slapping him, and Danneel was just finishing explaining what she meant by bringing sex out into the open.

“And because I consider myself sexually free and morally emancipated,” she concluded, “I am still a responsible, discriminating woman who does not intend to jump into bed with the first muscle-bound, egocentric male who _thinks_ he can seduce me by agreeing with _some_ of the things I believe in.”

“I only wanted to kiss you!” he cried in exasperation.

“Why?” she shot back.

“BECAUSE I LOVE YOU, THAT’S WHY!”

She scoffed.

“You don’t believe me, huh?”

“I do not!”

He slammed on the brakes, stopping the Impala a bare inch from the finish line.

She frowned. “What are you doing?”

“Proving that I love you.”

“You’ll lose the race!”

“Can you think of a better way to prove it?”

“JAY!” Jared cried in dismay.

But it was no use. Jensen pulled Danneel into a passionate kiss... and the Hannibal tore past the finish line, honking wildly.

“I won,” Misha gasped once he’d stopped the car. “I-I won! I WON!!!”

“You lost,” Danneel breathed once Jensen ended the kiss.

Jensen smiled. “Only the race.” And he kissed her again.

“I am invincible!” Misha was crowing, hugging the giant trophy that had been handed to him. “I am king! I am _the_ king!” Then he looked at the Impala again, and the truth dawned on him. “No, I’m not! I didn’t beat him! _He let me win!_ ”

“No!” Sebastian yelped.

“I can’t win this way!” Misha complained to Sebastian, dropping the trophy. “I can only win one way, my way!” And with that, he leapt out of the Hannibal and ran to jump up on the hood of the Impala, screaming, “You cheated! YOU CHEATED! You cheated, cheated, I hate you!”

Jensen released Danneel and stared incredulously at Misha, and Jared leaned forward to do the same.

“I refuse to accept! I won’t win any way but my way! You’ve ruined my reputation, do you hear? _You I hate!_ You with your hair that’s always combed, your suit that’s always white, your car that’s always clean! _I refuse to accept!_ I CHALLENGE YOU TO ANOTHER RACE!”

The crowd roared its approval.

And Jensen got out and thundered, “GET OFF MY HOOD!”

* * *

Preparing for the return race took six weeks or so. In that time, Danneel accepted Jensen’s proposal of marriage and introduced him and Jared to her best friend in Paris, an actress at the Théâter Athénée by the name of Genevieve Cortese. Jared was instantly smitten with Genevieve and she with him, and so instead of their being named (respectively) best man and maid of honor, they turned the ceremony at Notre Dame into a double wedding. Said wedding took place the day of the racers’ departure, and Danneel was still in her wedding dress when Jared helped her into the Impala’s shotgun seat. While Jensen and Danneel were making the race their honeymoon, Jared and Genevieve opted for two more weeks in Paris before making the westward journey back to New York via London and Dublin. That would give Jared time before Jensen’s return to make quiet preparations for the four of them to leave New York and return to Texas, which both men felt would be a better place to raise a family and retire in relative obscurity.

They’d all ensured their place in the history books. Now it was time to ensure their own futures.

Once farewells were said and both cars were finally ready to go, the starter fired his pistol. But only the Impala pulled away from the starting line. Misha kept the Hannibal where it was, chuckling maniacally as he watched the Impala drive off.

“Come on, Misha!” Sebastian urged. “Go!”

“Relax!” Misha replied, aiming the cannon at the “Just Married” sign adorning the Impala’s trunk. “This time I’m going to win it my way. Push the button, Bas!”

With a smirk, Sebastian pushed the button... and brought the Eiffel Tower down on their heads.

**The End**

* * *

[1] Do you speak Russian? (A/N: While the Potsdorf section was filmed in and around Vienna, I’m picturing Carpania as being somewhere in the Carpathians, probably around the Czech-Polish border. Thus, there might be a population of ethnic Germans living there—and with place names like Potsdorf and character names [in the movie] like Kühster and von Stuppe, the nobility all seem to be German—but probably also sizeable numbers of Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, and maybe even Hungarians and Russians. German might be one of the languages spoken, but unless there’s a specifically Carpanian language or dialect, it might be something of a gamble to find an average farmer who happens to speak one of the same languages you do.)

[2] Do you speak German?

[3] Yes, a little.

[4] Black coffee, please. (A/N: Poor concussed Jared! At least coffee/ _café_ / _Kaffee_ sounds more or less the same in most European languages.)


End file.
